The Second Wife Read online

  Yes, well, it’s difficult not to bear grudges when you’ve been bullied your whole life, Nicole would have liked to say, but she didn’t. ‘I’ll go and make some tea,’ she said instead.

  ‘No need,’ Lydia said. ‘Richard’s already made one. We discussed the lovely new apartment I’m moving into over a digestive, didn’t we, Richard?’

  ‘We did.’ Richard smiled, his eyes travelling to Nicole, who was now staring at him with her mouth agape.

  Her mother moving into an apartment? This was news to her.

  ‘They’re luxury apartments,’ Richard went on. ‘Much sought after, and closer to where we live, which would make it easier for us to visit. I told Lydia that, if she was interested, I could secure her one. She’s having a think about it, aren’t you, Lydia?’

  ‘I most certainly am,’ Lydia said, now looking at him in adoration. ‘This place is far too big for me to keep. And it will free up some money. I might even go on a cruise or two.’

  ‘Live it up a bit, hey, Lydia?’ Richard gave her a mischievous wink. ‘Why not? You’ve earned it.’

  ‘Most definitely.’ Lydia glanced pointedly at Nicole.

  ‘I have to get back to work,’ Richard said, taking hold of Nicole’s hand again and giving it a squeeze. ‘I’ve brought Lydia’s file down for her, so she can go through the various paperwork with you.’

  Leaning in to kiss her, he held her gaze meaningfully. Then he turned to Lydia, bending to kiss her cheek, at which Lydia blushed like a schoolgirl.

  ‘Bye, Lydia.’ He smiled and squeezed her hand. ‘It was lovely to meet you. I’ll call again soon. Meanwhile, take care of that ankle. And shout if you need any help with that paperwork. You have my number.’

  TWENTY-FIVE

  OLIVIA

  PRESENT

  ‘So, will you marry him, do you think?’ Olivia asked, as Rebecca applied the finishing touches to her make-up, preparing to go out to dinner with Richard. She actually did look quite beautiful, with her lustrous dark curls pinned into a loose up-do, which accentuated her high cheekbones and long, slender neck.

  ‘What?’ Rebecca stopped halfway through her application of lip gloss: soft coral. It suited her full lips, especially with her tan. Olivia could quite see why Richard would be particularly taken with her.

  ‘We hardly know each other, Liv.’ Rebecca laughed incredulously. ‘Why on earth would you think that either of us would be contemplating marriage?’

  But she did know him, in the biblical sense – thoroughly, judging by the moans of ecstasy that had emanated from his bedroom last night. Rebecca had thought Olivia was out, and with boring Laura having dragged Sam back off to Warwickshire, lest he be tempted elsewhere, it seemed she’d accepted Richard’s invitation to explore each other further.

  ‘Because he’s falling in love with you,’ Olivia said, as if it were perfectly obvious. ‘He’s bound to ask.’

  ‘But, why would he?’ Rebecca’s huge mocha-coloured eyes were filled with confusion. ‘I know we’re… seeing each other, but he’s still going to be grieving, Liv. It’s far too soon for him to be considering a serious relationship, let alone getting married again.’

  Pausing, Rebecca smiled, as if humouring her; as if now she’d had sex with him, she knew him better than she did – which was rather naive, in Olivia’s opinion.

  ‘Are you not serious about him then?’ she asked, holding her gaze.

  The woman was immediately flummoxed by that, as Olivia had suspected she might be. She could hardly confess that she was only interested in fucking her father, after all. Olivia doubted that was the case, though. She might be attractive but she wasn’t getting any younger. Richard was good-looking, eligible. He could have his pick of women of any age, of which she would be aware.

  Her brow furrowing, Rebecca pondered her answer. ‘Well, yes, I hoped we might see more of each other,’ she said, eventually, ‘but I hadn’t really thought about anything in the long term.’

  She would be now though. She would be experiencing a little flutter of panic, Olivia fancied, thinking she might do well to get her skates on and bag him before someone else did.

  Nodding, she did her best to look thoughtful. ‘Can I be honest with you, Becky?’

  ‘Yes,’ Rebecca said, turning to give Olivia her full attention. ‘Please do.’

  ‘If he’s made…’ Olivia hesitated, glancing awkwardly down and back. ‘If you and he have made love, then he will be taking it seriously, Becky. Really he will. Because he’s good-looking, people make assumptions about him, but he’s a one-woman man. He always has been. He – how can I put this? – has principles, I suppose you’d call them. I call it old-fashioned, but…’ She stopped, reading Rebecca’s expression interestedly. She was soaking it up. Olivia supposed women of a certain age would.

  Taking a breath, as if reluctant, she went on. ‘His parents never married,’ she said, glancing over her shoulder, as if worried about confiding. ‘His father treated his mother abysmally, womanising and drinking and getting abusive when he did. He left her, my gran, with nothing when he died. Dad looked out for her – financially, I mean. I think he thought she’d be relieved that his father wasn’t around any more, but she just couldn’t cope – with life, with anything. It was a self-esteem thing, I think. She started drinking herself and… well, Dad was broken-hearted when she died so suddenly.’

  Rebecca’s eyes widened in alarm. ‘Oh God,’ she said, paling visibly. ‘How? I mean, I had no idea. How did she die, his poor mother?’

  Painfully, probably. Olivia sighed inwardly. She really did wonder sometimes at how easily women allowed their emotions to rule their heads. Rebecca was clearly lapping all this up.

  ‘A heart attack. Dad was there at the time,’ she said, with a soulful sigh. ‘He was devastated. That was the first time I saw him cry. He made a promise to himself then, I think, never to treat a woman the way his father had treated his mother. He treats women respectfully, Becky. That’s why I think he will ask you at some point, not because he thinks he should, because you two… you know… but because he is falling in love with you. He won’t want to lose you. But if you’re not serious about him… I just thought you should know – for my Dad’s sake, I suppose.’

  ‘I see,’ Rebecca said, the furrow in her brow deepening as she tried to digest the news that she might lose him, a caring prize of a man, the kind she wasn’t likely to meet again in her lifetime. Olivia could almost see the cogs going round. Yes, she would be struggling with her conscience out of loyalty to her best friend. But Nicole was dead, when all was said and done. She was hardly going to claw her way out of her grave and scratch her eyes out.

  TWENTY-SIX

  REBECCA

  PRESENT

  Thinking about all that Olivia had said, the information she’d fed her, Rebecca tried to quell her nerves as they dined. He’d chosen the venue: Brown’s Restaurant at the Quay, a pretty location overlooking the bridge and the River Severn in central Worcester. The meal was fine cuisine and good service at its best. He was working to impress her, Rebecca guessed, dressed immaculately in a white linen shirt and cream chinos, which both offset his tan and highlighted his toned physique.

  Why had Olivia told her about his parents? She’d seemed determined that Rebecca should have that piece of information, and whilst it might have been presented as consideration for Richard, it seemed to be more manipulation than matchmaking. And why would she want to marry him off again, when she’d had such a disastrous relationship with Nicole?

  ‘So the highlight of your week was scouring the Birmingham rag market for bargains?’ Richard asked, going back to their conversation about her student days, once the waiter had served their coffee.

  Rebecca noted his expression: one of amused puzzlement, as if he couldn’t think of anything less exciting. ‘Not quite. Saturday night clubbing, or rather man-spotting, was the real highlight,’ she said, a teasing look in her eyes as she bit slowly into her mint.

  Trailing th
e tip of her tongue over her lips to mop up the chocolate, she noted Richard’s gaze lingering. What was going through his mind, she wondered. What kind of future, apart from the immediate, was he really contemplating with her? No doubt she would find out. ‘Nicole had an eye for a bargain though,’ she went on. ‘She could always make the most obscure thing into something beautiful.’

  Richard’s gaze came back to hers. ‘I know,’ he said, guilt flitting across his features.

  ‘You’ve heard enough about me. Tell me about yourself,’ Rebecca said, having revealed as much as she wanted him to know. Her relationships, beyond her marriage, she wasn’t about to go into. ‘About your childhood. Your parents. I know hardly anything about you.’

  Now Richard looked awkward. Very.

  ‘Oh dear, sore subject?’ she asked, as he picked up a sugar spoon, fixing his gaze on it and twirling it pensively between his thumb and forefingers.

  ‘Not really. It’s just…’ Richard glanced up. ‘It wasn’t great, my childhood. My father… Let’s just say he wasn’t the sort of man that should have fathered children. My mother never really got over their volatile relationship. She died suddenly; in front of me, actually. Heart attack.’

  ‘Oh no. I’m so sorry.’ Rebecca reached to still his hand. ‘That must have been so awful. And you just a child.’

  Richard drew in a breath and looked back at her. ‘It was. Not something I find easy to talk about, to be honest.’

  ‘No,’ Rebecca said understandingly. ‘Of course not.’

  ‘As for the rest, nothing spectacular: comprehensive education, left school with not many qualifications and then went straight into the building trade. Luckily, I had a flair for figures and enjoyed the work, and the rest followed.’

  Rebecca smiled, but she was only half listening. Her mind was on Olivia, and her claim to have witnessed Richard crying over his mother’s death. ‘Boy done good,’ she said, realising Richard had stopped talking and was watching her.

  ‘Eventually. Not so well on the personal front, unfortunately.’ He shrugged sadly.

  Rebecca squeezed his hand and eased herself to her feet. ‘Ladies’ room,’ she said, nodding in that direction and then leaning to kiss him softly on the cheek.

  Smiling at one or two fellow diners, she walked calmly to the toilets, though her heart was thrumming a manic beat in her chest. She needed to phone Sam. He’d mentioned something about swinging by on their way to a concert in Worcester. Rebecca wasn’t sure they would , but she wanted to put him off nevertheless.

  Richard surprised her when, having sent Sam a text when she couldn’t get hold of him, she returned to the table. ‘I’d like to offer to pay,’ he said. ‘However, I think Nicole deemed that to be controlling?’ He smiled as he said it, as if he didn’t quite get it, but understood why she would. ‘How about a compromise? I pay for this meal, you pay for the next?’

  ‘Done,’ Rebecca said, still trying to make things add up in her head. Would he really have remembered that detail if he hadn’t cared for her?

  ‘How about a walk?’ he suggested, taking her hand once the bill was settled. ‘It’s a beautiful evening.’

  ‘That sounds like a plan.’ Rebecca decided she would be glad of the exercise, to work off the wine and focus her thoughts on what her reaction should be if this was leading where she thought it might. ‘Though I’ll have to walk a fair way to burn off the chocolate-and-marshmallow brownie.’

  ‘It was a bit moreish, wasn’t it?’ he smiled, opening the door and allowing her to go before him out of the restaurant.

  ‘It’s a lovely restaurant,’ Rebecca said, surveying it from the outside. ‘Intimate and cosy.’

  Richard nodded. ‘A bit too cosy for me, if I’m honest. I’m not great in confined spaces,’ he added, as Rebecca glanced at him curiously. ‘Got trapped in a lift once. Long story.’

  ‘Ah, brave of you to admit it,’ she said, amazed that he had. Some men wouldn’t admit as easily to their vulnerabilities.

  ‘What about you?’ he asked her. ‘Do you have any…’

  ‘Phobias?’ Rebecca finished, as he searched for the word. ‘Not really. I tend to feel the fear and do it anyway.’

  ‘I think I gathered that.’ Richard smiled, his expression a combination of amusement and admiration as he looked at her.

  They walked on in silence for a while, stopping as they neared the bridge to watch a gaggle of glorious white swans gliding ghostlike along the river. Rebecca’s thoughts were inevitably on Nicole as she looked across the calm water, thinking of the secrets it held, the lives it had stolen. Where were Richard’s thoughts, she wondered. Was he down there in the dark underbelly of the river with her? Or had he really moved on so swiftly?

  He reached for her hand, after a moment. ‘Shall we?’ he asked, squeezing it gently and nodding them onwards.

  Pulling her closer as they turned, he threaded an arm around her waist. Would he really propose to her, Rebecca wondered? As quickly as he had to Nicole, and so soon after her death? She’d expected he would at some juncture, but as she spent more time with him, his possible motives were becoming muddled in Rebecca’s mind. Knowing what she knew, it seemed almost inconceivable, but was it possible he was doing it for love? That he’d really played no part in the events that had led to Nicole’s death? That he was a man who believed in love? If that was so, wouldn’t that make him as naive as he was supposedly perfect?

  ‘You’ll be leaving to go back to France soon,’ Richard said quietly.

  Rebecca nodded. ‘I have things to tie up. Furniture that needs to be sold, as well as organising storage of anything I want to keep. Plus, I still have to find somewhere to rent here, at least in the short term, until I find the right property to buy. I think I’ll start looking around properly once I’m back in the UK.’

  ‘And will that be soon?’

  Rebecca hesitated. ‘Do you want it to be?’

  ‘Very much,’ Richard said, tightening his arm around her.

  ‘Why?’ Rebecca asked, as they slowed their walk to a stop.

  Richard didn’t answer immediately, turning towards her instead. His eyes were dark and intense as they searched hers. In the light of the streetlamps, Rebecca saw a flicker of uncertainty therein. ‘Because you’re fantastic in bed,’ he said, with a nervous smile.

  ‘Thank you for the compliment.’ Rebecca mock-scowled. ‘I think.’

  ‘Because I like being with you,’ Richard amended, his look back to serious.

  Rebecca smiled. ‘Likewise.’

  ‘Would you consider something while you’re away?’ he asked her.

  ‘As in?’ Rebecca eyed him quizzically.

  ‘Rather than rent somewhere, would you consider staying at the house? I’ve decided to take if off the market,’ he rushed on, before Rebecca had a chance to answer. ‘There’s plenty of space for storage, too, if you need it, and… it seems to make more sense than hunting for a property to rent, which presumably you’d have to do online, which might be risky. I thought it might be more convenient, and I, er… Well, I hoped you might consider it.’ Stopping, finally, he shrugged hopefully.

  Rebecca raised her eyebrows in surprise. ‘Richard, are you asking me to move in with you?’

  ‘Yes, I think I am,’ he said, his expression also one of surprise. ‘Actually, I definitely am,’ he added, with a resolute nod.

  ‘But…’ Rebecca shook her head bewilderedly. ‘It’s so soon after…’

  ‘Losing Nicole,’ Richard finished, his expression apprehensive as he searched her face. ‘I know, and I realise it might seem as if I don’t care, as if I don’t miss her, but…’ Running a hand over his neck, he glanced at the skies and then back to her. ‘Looking out over the river just now, I wondered what she would think.’

  His thoughts had been of her, then. ‘And what conclusion did you come to?’

  ‘That she would be glad – happy for me – that it’s you I’ve found myself falling in love with.’

  D
umbfounded, Rebecca said nothing.

  ‘I love you, Rebecca,’ he said, his eyes a shade darker as he reached again for her hand. ‘I don’t want to lose you. I’m not sure how you feel, but if, by any chance, it’s the same, will you consider staying with me?’

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  LYDIA

  PREVIOUS YEAR – NOVEMBER

  Taking it steadily, Lydia made slow progress up the cellar steps. She shouldn’t have ventured down here with her ankle still not properly mended, but she’d wanted to fetch a decent wine to offer Richard over lunch. It was the least she could do after all he was doing for her. She’d thought she would die in this mausoleum of a house, which she’d once loved. Sadly, it held too many bad memories now: recollections of her hellish years spent in purgatory with a man who was a tyrant. Nicole had thought she’d had problems in her first marriage. She should have tried living with her father, Lydia had once told her, forgetting for a moment that she had. Nicole had claimed that her first husband was the same as her father – a bully, she’d called him, a misogynist. Lydia had never quite understood why he’d earned that label. All men could be a bit controlling, after all. It was in their natures as the providers. Nicole should have counted her blessings, in Lydia’s opinion. Her husband had always been attentive, as far as she could see: phoning her to make sure she’d arrived and what time she would be home, if she visited on her own – although such occasions had been rare. He’d always seemed happy to accompany her anywhere. He hadn’t been violent or dismissive of her, as far as Lydia knew. Nicole had been unhappy though. Perhaps she’d never truly loved him, as Lydia had loved William. At least she had, for a while.

  Richard had been a surprise. Extremely handsome and impeccably mannered, he was quite the catch. Lydia couldn’t believe Nicole had managed to net him so easily. Not that she wasn’t beautiful enough to bag such a man. She was. Nicole had been exceptionally pretty as a child, although her father had never thought so, considering her red hair to be an unfortunate affliction. She was so lacking in poise, though, and such a dreamer, appearing to have no sense of direction in her life. That only seemed to endear her to Richard, however, who’d obviously fallen for her, whatever her shortcomings. Lydia had been suspicious of him, at first. How could she not have been, given how quickly he’d swept Nicole off her feet? But then, having met him, she’d quite realised how he had – and why Nicole had grabbed him with both hands and raced him up the aisle. The man clearly cared about her and he was extremely successful, therefore with no separate agenda.