Bone Deep: Episode 38

I sigh heavily, and then anger suddenly floods through me, fire in my veins. Lucie cannot be allowed to wreck her sister’s life

I’ll get Lucie to plant up the pansies. Maybe she’ll have a view on what we can do with the garden.

She generally has a view on most things. I realise I’ve been allowing myself to lean on her, but now I’m not so sure that’s a good thing.

My little exchange with Reuben has put a different colour on things.

I thought I could trust her, but now? The girl’s been sleeping with her sister’s boyfriend!

Had Reuben been hovering under the pergola like a bad penny?

If he hadn’t shown up, Lucie might have invited Arthur in, made him a meal.

It could have been the start of something, but the prospect now fills me with dread.

Is that what I want for my son? Do I want him to go through all the misery that Anna Madigan put me through?

For weeks now I’ve had some instinct that I’ve been missing something.

Call it intuition, but I felt it deep within my bones, that familiar feeling of the truth finally coming to light.

And back there, at the mill, it all clicked into place. Reuben’s reappearance is a red flag – a huge one. Now it makes perfect sense: Lucie’s black moods, the way she moons about the house like some kind of gothic heroine.

And the poem...

The poem must have been about him! Her sister’s boyfriend.

My brief flare of triumph at my own detective work is quickly doused.

How could she? Her own sister?

Haunting

No wonder all these old memories are haunting me. I thought I’d long since ground them to dust, but they’re always there, just out of sight.

There must have been signs, clues, which I chose to ignore.

Perhaps if we’d communicated more, Jim and I. If I’d looked up from my notes once in a while, if...

I sigh heavily, and then anger suddenly floods through me, fire in my veins.

Lucie cannot be allowed to wreck her sister’s life, as

Anna Madigan wrecked mine. Maybe it’s not too late. I get stiffly to my feet and call to the dogs.

I’m waiting for him on the road.

The dogs have scattered, apart from Jethro, who is watching me nervously, because he hates roads and this is the one thing I keep warning them not to do.

The grey car eases into sight, carefully avoiding the potholes on the track from the mill.

Pity Reuben wasn’t so cautious that last time he left, he could have saved everyone a lot of bother.

Better still, he should have made a proper job of things.

I imagine Reuben lying in the wreckage, life extinct, and a smile plays around my lips.

I’m still smiling as I step out in front of his car. He brakes abruptly. I can’t see his expression for the light striping the spotless windscreen, but his window purrs down and, hands stuffed in pockets, I amble around to the driver’s side.

“What the hell are you doing?”

Irritation

His irritation is raw, aggravated by whatever exchange he’s had with Lucie.

Hopefully she’s given him his marching orders. Enjoying the height advantage, I stare him out for a heartbeat or two.

He looks very uncomfortable, fists white on the steering wheel.

The new-car smell steals up to meet me.

“Nice car,” I say. “You’re obviously not short of a bob or two.”

“Do you actually want something?”

He revs the engine a little, just to make a point, but I won’t be hurried.

My fingers make contact with something in my right-hand pocket. Paper, folded into a thick wedge.

“I’m on to you. I want you to leave Lucie alone. You think you can roll up here, disrupting all our lives –” “It’s none of your damn business what we do!” His tone wipes the humour from my face. I lean in, grip the car door.

“It’s my business if you’re having it away in my cottage! Under my nose! You have no idea of the hurt you’ve caused. The pain, the heartache...”

He mutters something and jabs at a button. The window begins to nudge at my palms.

“No! I haven’t finished with you yet, you scoundrel!” I grip the window, rattle it with all my might, and he’s swearing and grappling with the button.

The window glides down again, giving me room to lean in and grab the front of his shirt.

“You listen to me, you little s***!” My spittle lands on his cheek.

He shies away from me, moaning about an injured shoulder, but I tighten my grip, shake him like Max worrying a rabbit.

“You don’t realise what you’ve done, do you? Your brain is in your pants. You never once stopped to think what this would do to me.

“You broke my heart – made me into something I’m not, a monster, and I can never forgive you. Or her! Never!”

I realise Reuben is staring at me with his mouth open. I can smell fear, like old meat, on his breath.

I relax my hands, smooth his shirt and pat him on the cheek. “Anyway. I’ve said my piece.

“You’d better get out of here, laddie.”

Realisation

At some point the engine has stalled. He squeezes the steering wheel again, guns the car into life. “You’re crazy. Mad.”

My fingers caress the paper in my pocket, trying to remember what it is. As realisation dawns, I begin to smile.

Lucie’s poem to person unknown. But we know now, don’t we?

“If you want to know what you’ve done, maybe you’d better read this.” I wave the slip of paper at him.

“This is what happens when you mess with a woman’s feelings – with two women’s feelings. You’re playing one sister off against the other, just like young Musgrave...”

But I’m talking to myself. The car has already lurched forward, wheels spinning a little in the mud. I feel cold spray from the puddles on my ankles.

Reuben is staring grimly ahead, but his window is still down. On an impulse, like posting a letter, I pop the poem through the gap.

Fly, little bird. Who knows where you will land?

More tomorrow.

• Bone Deep by Sandra Ireland is published by Polygon (£8.99, pbk). Sandra Ireland’s latest novel, The Unmaking of Ellie Rook, is available now (Polygon, £8.99.)