Flawed Page 18

  ‘I don't think that,’ said Daniel quietly. ‘I don't think you do either.’

  But she was getting a kind of wounded satisfaction from her sense of grievance, wasn't about to give it up. ‘Damn right I do. I could see him doing the sums. Which would be cheaper - getting rid of a baby or raising it? No comparison, is it? Eighteen bloody years you're responsible for them - and that's if you're lucky and they leave school and get a job. If they go on to university you can still be feeding them when they're twenty-five! By which time Jack'll be in his seventies. I'll be pushing sixty!’ The realisation appalled her. ‘Maybe he was right. Maybe I should have got rid of it while I had the chance.’

  ‘I know you don't mean that,’ Daniel said with certainty.

  Her voice was shadowed with fear. ‘I don't know, Daniel. Maybe I do. I'm too old, and too single, to be doing this. It's hard graft. You need to be fit, and you need to be young.’

  ‘You're only thirty-three,’ he reminded her.

  ‘All the evidence shows you should do this in your twenties.’

  He didn't know whether she most needed a slap or a hug. ‘Never mind the statistics, just think about the women you know. Women who've had first babies in their thirties, never mind second ones. It's very common and most of the time it's very successful. Most people have a lot more money in their thirties than in their twenties, and more money means less worry. As for being on your own…’ He let the sentence fade away.

  ‘What?’

  ‘You're not really, you know. You're surrounded by people who care about you and this baby. People you can call on for help. You've got Marta living upstairs, and she'll be cooing and clucking over it like an old hen gone broody. Whatever you say, Jack won't see you lack for anything. I don't doubt John and Julia will be happy to lend a hand if you ask them -Julia thinks the world of Paddy, she won't make much distinction between her and her brother or sister. And then there's me.’

  Brodie gave him a wry smile. ‘My emergency service.’

  ‘If you like.’

  ‘My fall-back position. My’ - if she'd seen the words coming she'd have stopped them - ‘last resort.’

  Daniel flushed. ‘If you say so. I'd rather be your last resort than no resort at all.’

  She knew she'd managed to hurt him again -unintentionally but carelessly, thoughtlessly. She swept the dark hair from her face and leant over the desk, her eyes grabbing his. ‘Daniel, that's not what I meant. Of course it's not what I meant. You must know how much you mean to me. Dear God, it's these pregnancy hormones - I can't even talk straight any more!

  ‘You're my rock. You're the strength that keeps me going when my own strength is gone. You're my best friend, my dearest companion, the better part of my soul. And yes, you're my last resort. You're the place I come to when I can't even go home. The place where, whatever tempests rage outside, I know I can lay down my head and rest and be safe. Without you, it wouldn't matter what riches or lovers the world might offer - I'd be lost, forever.’ Her eyes were luminous, not with tears but with truth. Every word of it came straight from her heart.

  ‘I love you, Daniel Hood,’ she went on intently. ‘Well, you know that. And I know that the way I love you and the way you love me aren't exactly the same any more. I wish they were. I wish with every fibre of my being that I could do what you want - take what you're offering with a clear conscience, knowing I could return it and never short-change you. There's no one on this earth I'd rather spend the rest of my days with, and grow old and deaf and crotchety with.

  ‘And I'd do it in an instant,’ she said, and he knew she meant it, ‘except for one thing. Only a little thing, except to you and me. It would be a lie. I might wish with all my heart I could feel that way about you, but I don't. I'd end up hurting you - hurting you more - and I honest to God think I'd rather die than do that.’

  He tried to interject, to say maybe that was his call, not hers, but she wouldn't let him - ploughed on determinedly, hunched urgently over the desk so that the long dark curls framed her pale, intense face. ‘Don't ever think that what I feel for you is less than what you feel for me. It isn't. It's just different. But it's still, apart from my child - my children,’ she amended ruefully, ‘the most important thing in my life. Jack used to say that and I denied it, but he was right. I wasn't fair to him. How could I be? I was fond of him, in lots of ways, but I didn't care for him the way I care for you. If the three of us had been on the Titanic and I'd had two life-jackets, Jack would have had to swim to Nova Scotia.’

  That wrung a little chuckle out of Daniel. Nothing she was saying was much of a surprise to him. What stunned him speechless was that she'd come right out and say it. That she would admit it to herself.

  ‘Oh Daniel,’ she murmured brokenly, ‘I'm making such a mess of my life! I've had the choice of two good men to love and be with - and even that's not enough for me, I want that bit of this one and this bit of that one, and I've already driven one of them away, and if I lost you too through being so bloody stupid I'd deserve to be alone. Can you forgive me? Can you believe that this isn't how I want to be, it's just how I am? And if it was something I could change I would, tomorrow, but I don't think it is. I think it's something I have to live with. I do so hope it's something you can live with too.’

  He got up from the sofa. For a heart-stopping moment she was afraid he was going to leave the way Deacon had left, driven away by the contrariness of her passions. Instead he moved round the desk and put his arms around her. His slight body contrived to enfold her bulky one, his cheek resting on top of her head so that his words came to her through the bones of her skull.

  He said simply, ‘Don't you dare change a thing. We're all right. We'll be all right.’

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  That night wasn't the first Daniel never made it to his bed. More than once he'd set up the telescope on his balcony to take advantage of those particularly clear conditions that can occur when there's the tin taste of frost in the air, and spent an hour or so looking for comets and another half hour admiring a planetary conjunction, and been surprised when his evening's observation was curtailed by the milky bleaching of the sky that heralds the sun.

  But this night was cloudy. Even had it been crystal clear, he had too much on his mind for star-gazing. A drinking man would have opened a bottle of Scotch: Daniel made himself a pot of coffee at eleven o'clock, and another some time after two, and sat alone in his calm grey living room, sipping and thinking.

  The same man who would have opened the bottle of whisky would have been mulling how he could turn the situation to his advantage. That would not have made him a bad man. He would probably have believed that what he wanted was the best for both parties and the woman would thank him later; and who's to say he'd have been wrong? Sometimes there is no perfect outcome to be sought: no Holy Grail, no glass slipper. What's best is what those involved believe is best, and sometimes the act of believing strongly enough is sufficient to make it so. The man with the bottle might have got his heart's desire and made the woman happy.

  But Daniel was not that man, and even if he'd thought of exploiting Brodie's vulnerability in that way he couldn't have done it. For an intelligent and self-sufficient man he had remarkably little confidence in his own worth. The mere fact that it was what he wanted above all else would have persuaded him it was not in Brodie's best interests. Not now; probably not at all.

  So he sat all night alone on the beach, and heard the tide come in and then heard it go out again, and everything that passed through his mind – and was considered and dismissed, but instead of disappearing from the scene merely slinked away and joined the back of the queue again – was not his own needs but those of his friend.

  By the time the false dawn was painting the sky with oystercoloured streaks he knew what to do.

  Wednesday was when the magistrates sat in Dimmock. They dealt with speeding motorists, with the sort of crime that Alix Hyde had no interest in, and with remands. It wasn't usually nec
essary for Deacon to attend remand hearings – often he sent Charlie Voss, sometimes it was enough to have a DC utter the well-worn formula. We believe we can connect the defendant with the offence and ask for a remand in custody (or on bail if Deacon was in a good mood) to the court of… Usually they got what they asked for. Occasionally the bench looked at the white-haired old lady in the dock and decided that, even if she did make a run for it, she wasn't going to get far with two walking-sticks and a pacemaker.

  Today Voss was busy. Playing with his new friend was the expression that sprang unbidden to Deacon's mind. He knew it was childish. He'd offered Voss to Detective Inspector Hyde: it was perverse and, yes, childish now to resent the fact that they were working well together. Any one of his CID team could have represented him adequately at the magistrates’ court. The only reason he went himself was to give Voss a twinge of conscience when he heard.

  Now that he mostly went to court only to win important cases – or at least, to be so bad a loser that the bench would think twice about crossing him next time – he'd forgotten just how boring most of the work is. Careless drivers. Reckless drivers. Dangerous drivers. Drunk drivers. Driving without a licence. Driving without insurance. Driving without a Road Fund Licence. Unlawful possession of controlled substances. Unlawful possession of a fireman…

  Deacon beckoned the clerk. ‘I think there's a typo here.’

  The man looked, looked again, hissed ‘Oh shit!’ and took the list back for amendment, leaving Deacon feeling his morning had not been entirely wasted. Duane Childers, five foot three in his bovver boots, could have proved beyond reasonable doubt his inability to even pick up a fireman – at least, not without first putting down his scatter-gun.

  With Duane charged with the right offence, and bail sought but denied in view of the fact that said firearm had been discharged no fewer than four times when the Woodgreen Raiders beat the South City Stars at baseball, the defendant headed – disconsolate but not entirely surprised – for the prison van and Deacon headed for Battle Alley.

  Daniel was waiting for him on the steps of the courthouse. ‘Have you got a minute?’

  Deacon eyed him suspiciously. ‘I suppose.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  They took the scenic route, through the park. Daniel talked and Deacon listened. Every time Deacon opened his mouth to respond Daniel talked faster. At one point they sat on a bench, Deacon with his legs stretched out in front of him, staring up at the monument, Daniel still talking so earnestly it meant using his hands. Only when he'd exhausted every argument he'd rehearsed in the silent hours of the night did he stop.

  Without looking at him Deacon said thickly, ‘You're a very strange man, Daniel Hood.’

  Daniel blinked. ‘Possibly. But then, I'm not asking you to marry me.’

  ‘But you are asking me to marry Brodie.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Because she's carrying my child.’

  Daniel shook his head. ‘Not really. If she was carrying somebody else's child I'd still be asking you to marry her.’

  ‘Tell me why again.’ Deacon held up an admonitory finger. ‘The short version.’

  ‘Because she needs you. She needed you before – the difference the baby's made is that now she knows she needs you.’

  ‘That's not what she told me.’

  Daniel laughed. Deacon thought he'd never heard such a lonely sound. ‘Did you expect her to? Jack, the one thing we both know about Brodie is that she hates to admit to weakness of any kind. Of course she said she could manage alone; of course she pretended not to care. She didn't want you to feel you owed her anything, and she didn't want to push you into a marriage that wasn't your first choice.

  ‘That doesn't mean she's happy with how things are. She's worried and she's scared. And she misses you. And I don't know if there's any chance of repairing what the two of you once had, but I know that not long ago it gave you a lot of pleasure and it gave her a lot of pleasure, and I'm hoping you'll think it's worth a try…’

  Finally Deacon looked at him. There was twenty years between them, and even that wasn't the biggest difference. They lived by different creeds, different ideologies. The only thing they had in common was Brodie, and being a woman rather than a football team she was the cause of more not less division between them. ‘Daniel – if you think she'd welcome a proposal right now, why aren't you in there chancing your arm?’

  ‘You know why,’ said Daniel in a low voice.

  I know she cares more for you than she ever cared for me.’

  ‘That's not true. But even if it was, me and her isn't an option. Don't think I haven't suggested it because I have. She looked at me as if I was proposing incest. Much as I might regret it, that's not the kind of relationship we have. That's the kind of relationship you have. Had. Could have again. She needs you, Jack. Not me – you. If you miss this chance there may not be another.’

  ‘That's not the best argument I've ever heard for getting married,’ growled Deacon. ‘Grab her while she's low – when she's back on form she'll expect to do better.’

  Daniel gave a slow grin. ‘Perhaps we're all getting a little long in the tooth to hang on for ungovernable passion.’

  ‘You're not,’ Deacon pointed out. ‘You're twenty-seven, for God's sake!’

  ‘Twenty-eight,’ Daniel corrected him. ‘And Brodie's thirty-three, and she thinks she's too old to be having another child much less raising one alone.’

  Deacon tilted his eyebrows. ‘She said that?’ Daniel nodded. Deacon drew a deep breath. ‘All right. I'll talk to her. I'm not going to propose to her. I'm not even going to proposition her. But I will talk to her.’

  ‘You won't regret it,’ promised Daniel.

  Deacon fixed him with a gaze like a pikestaff. ‘Daniel – I'm regretting it already.’

  They walked on through the park and crossed into Battle Alley, and parted at the steps to the police station as Deacon turned in and Daniel continued towards Shack Lane.

  But he didn't get much further. Before Deacon had even gone inside a car squealed round the corner and ground to a halt, spitting dirt, a metre from the pavement. Adam Selkirk leapt out, leaving the door wide, a hazard to traffic. ‘You little bastard!’ he yelled. ‘What have you done with them? Where are my wife and my son?’

  You shout, ‘What have you done with my wife, you bastard?’ in front of a police station and people are going to come to the window. One of those who came to the window of the top-storey CID offices was Alix Hyde.

  Deacon changed direction as smoothly as Ginger Rogers, so that anyone who hadn't seen him a second earlier would have sworn he was coming out of the building and heading down the steps. It wasn't so much that he felt the urge to protect Daniel from a large and overwrought solicitor, more that he wanted to watch.

  Daniel was fully conscious of where they were. He couldn't have chosen a better spot for the confrontation. He quelled his natural urge to run and waited for Selkirk to reach him.

  If you're a lot bigger than most people, there are three ways you can go. You can compensate, choosing your every word and gesture to reassure people who might otherwise feel intimidated – the gentle giant approach. You can make the most of a natural advantage and do a lot of looming, and excuse yourself on the grounds that it's not bullying if you keep your hands in your pockets. Or you can do what Deacon did, at least most of the time – not make an issue of it unless someone else did, and then flatten them with a clear conscience.

  Adam Selkirk was not a police officer. There were few occasions in his professional life when it was really useful to be built like a brick privy. Nor was it any great advantage at home – his son was a pre-pubescent twelve-year-old, his wife a slight woman: it didn't take a big man to physically dominate either of them. In consequence, Daniel thought he wasn't sure what to do about the fact that he was so much bigger than the object of his ire. Obviously he wanted to hit him – that was how he resolved all his personal frustrations. But this was not just a public
street, it was a public street with a police station on it. However much trouble it gave him usually, restraint was undoubtedly the best policy today. So when he was close enough for Daniel to smell his aftershave he stopped, hands fisted by his sides, quaking with rage.

  Daniel said quietly, ‘Were you looking for me, Mr Selkirk?’

  Deacon watched with interest. All he wanted for was popcorn.

  ‘Where is she?’ demanded Selkirk. For the moment he was going with the low-voice-full-of-menace option.

  Saying Who? would be disingenuous to the point of dishonesty. Daniel said, ‘She's safe. They both are.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘I'm not telling you.’

  ‘She's my wife!’

  ‘Yes. Not your punchbag.’

  There was no way of knowing if Daniel was the first to have noticed the bruises on Noah and his mother, only that he was the first to have done something about them. A man who'd been getting away with a little murder every week, possibly for years, must have been stunned to find suddenly there were consequences. Like, having it said out loud in the middle of the street. Discretion, like good manners, is one of those oils that help the world go round smoothly, and some things are not mentioned in polite society.

  There are certain advantages to being an outsider, Daniel had found. One was, if you're not used to having society's approval you're not afraid of losing it.

  ‘Did she tell you that?’ demanded Selkirk. His voice was unsteady.

  ‘No. Neither did Noah. It's hardly a secret, though, when they're walking round with the evidence printed on their faces.’

  ‘You don't know what you're talking about,’ sneered Selkirk. ‘Now tell me where I can find my family.’

  ‘No,’ Daniel said again. ‘Mr Selkirk, your wife knows your phone number. If she wanted to talk she'd call you. If she wanted you to fetch her, she'd call you. If she hasn't told you where she is, I'm not going to.’

  Veins were thumping like jack-hammers in Adam Selkirk's temples. ‘You can't do this. Noah is my son. I have a right to know where he is. He hasn't been in school since Monday. Why not? Where is he? Where has she taken him?’