Love And Devotion Part 2

After a brisk goodbye she rang off. Without the aid of a crystal ball she knew exactly what the future held. It was adios time, inevitably. Why would Spencer want to stay involved with her now that she lived so far away and had two children to bring up? She'd been mad to think it could be otherwise.

Smarting with hurt pride and the sheer unfairness of it, she flipped open her mobile again and scrolled through for the number she always tapped in when she needed a good rant. She'd got as far as putting the phone to her ear when she realised what she was doing. Very slowly, she closed the mobile and held it tightly in her fist. It was one of the things she found almost impossible to come to terms with: accepting that Felicity was no longer around to talk to, that she wasn't there at the other end of the line to be told the latest office joke, or to fill Harriet in on a missed episode of Footballers' Wives, or just to gossip about nothing in particular.

She decided she needed some fresh air to clear her head and improve her mood. But when she stepped outside and locked the front door behind her, she found that fresh air was in short supply. August, with its unbreathable, muggy air that was thick with pollen, was her least favourite month of the year. It was when her asthma was at its worst and she always had to be sure she was never too far from her inhaler. But a short walk along the ca.n.a.l would be okay. The moment she started to feel a tightness in her chest, she'd turn round.

Pocketing her set of keys, she looked across the road and saw a large white van. Its tailgate was lowered and furniture, piled higgledy-piggledy, was clearly in the process of being removed and carried up the drive. A self-drive Rent-A-Van, noted Harriet. The people who usually moved in to the four-bedroomed house were never around for long. For the last twenty years it had been owned by a couple who worked abroad and rented it out in their absence. Dozens of young families and professional couples had come and gone; consequently it was the shabbiest house in the road. The general feeling in the neighbourhood was that a permanent resident would smarten the place up. But judging from the tatty-looking Rent-A-Van, yet another temporary occupant was moving in. She wondered who. It was strange that Dora hadn't been on the case and brought them news of who, what, when and how. Just then, a stockily built man in baggy shorts appeared in the open doorway. Annoyed she'd been caught gawping, Harriet pretended she hadn't noticed him and walked on down the road.

Chapter Five.

'Where do you want this?'

Will bobbed up from behind the sofa, where he was plugging in the CD player, and checked out the large box Marty was holding. 'Bung it on top of the other box over there in the corner,' he said.

'I will, but on the condition that we stop for some lunch. If not, I'll have you in an industrial tribunal faster than you can say, "Put the kettle on."'

'Would that be before or after I've had you arrested for a breach of the Public Order Act? Who'd you borrow those shorts from? Johnny Vegas?'

'Ha, ha. And here's me doing the best-friend routine only to be on the receiving end of fattist jokes.'

'I could run through my extensive collection of follically challenged quips, if you'd prefer.'

Marty put the box down with a thump. 'What I'd prefer is for you to get your a.r.s.e into gear and make me a sandwich. I'm starving.' He wiped the sweat from his forehead with the back of an arm. 'Don't suppose you know where I can lay my hands on a cold beer, do you? Trust you to move on the hottest and muggiest day of the year.'

'I can do d.a.m.n-all about the weather, but the cold-beer situation is well under control. Help yourself to a can from the cool-box on the kitchen table.'

'And lunch?'

'If you stop whingeing long enough, that will be brought out to you in the garden in about quarter of an hour.'

'Now you're talking.'

Minutes later, with Marty taking a break outside, Will retrieved a loaf of bread, a tub of Flora, and a packet of bacon from the cool-box. He cleared a s.p.a.ce around the cooker and set to work on throwing some lunch together. Once he'd sussed how the gas hob worked, he loaded up the frying pan with rashers, then b.u.t.tered half a loaf of sliced bread and squirted a generous amount of HP sauce onto Marty's bread. They'd been friends long enough to know each other's likes and dislikes perfectly. Not dissimilar from a marriage, really. Except Will's friendship with Marty had never turned sour, unlike his marriage.

It was eight years since he and Maxine had divorced but it still felt as if it were yesterday, probably because Maxine never let him forget what a b.a.s.t.a.r.d he'd been. Oh, and a loser, too. That was a constant favourite of hers. 'The trouble with you, Will,' she'd say, as if he'd ever asked for her opinion, 'is that you're never going to amount to anything for the simple reason that you refuse to grow up.'

'And there was me thinking it was my boyish charm that got me where I am,' he'd said only last week when she was in his office, once again raking over the coals of their burnt-out marriage, listing yet more of his failings.

She was interrogating him about his reasons for moving. 'What's wrong with where you are?' she'd asked.

'Well, honey,' he'd replied, all silky-smooth and knowing it would annoy the h.e.l.l out of her, 'I'd tell you if it was any of your business. But seeing as it isn't, you'll have to reach your own conclusion.'

'You're moving in with someone? Is that it?'

'I might be.'

'Okay, so you're not. I can't say I'm surprised. And not just because you change your women more often than your boxer shorts. Or maybe it's them. Perhaps they see the light just in time and turn tail.'

'I'm sure you're right, dear. You usually are. Now, if you've had your fun, I have important things to do.'

She'd tipped back her head and laughed, her even, white teeth framed by glossy pink lips. 'William Hart doing something important. Now this I have to see.'

'Then pull up a chair and learn from the master.' Reaching for the phone, he'd added, 'While you're here, you could make yourself useful by putting the kettle on. If that isn't beneath you these days.'

Fortunately she hadn't stuck around and after she'd swept off in one of her up-yours-see-you-around-sucker flounces, and after he'd said, 'Be sure to give my best wishes to PC Plod, won't you?' he'd been able to get down to business. Putting the phone back in its cradle, he'd closed the door of his ramshackle office and, tuning to Radio Four, he'd rolled up his sleeves for his afternoon fix of The Archers. It didn't take much to please him these days.

Turning the rashers over and lowering the heat on the gas hob, he supposed that Maxine's opinion of him would never change. In her eyes he would always be the bad guy.

The big girl's blouse of a husband who dared to have an early mid-life crisis.

The lousy husband who played around.

The brute of a husband who broke her heart.

Although it was debatable she had one of those.

One way or another, he had a hard reputation to live up to. It wasn't easy playing the villain every day of his life. Or the village idiot. Just occasionally he'd like to think he was a cut above your average no-good ex husband. He'd never once raised his hand to a woman. He'd never drunk to excess. He'd never picked his nose in public. And surely, what counted for more than anything, he was perfectly toilet-trained and never splashed or left the seat up. In some quarters, he'd be considered quite a catch.

And if he'd been such a bad lot, why had she stuck around as long as she had? Thirteen years in all.

The answer to that, as she'd repeatedly flung at him, was the only good things to come out of their relationship: Gemma and Suzie. Apples and eyes didn't come close. His gorgeous daughters - Gemma, seventeen and Suzie, nineteen - were the crowning glory of his life. In many ways, marrying Maxine had been the best thing he'd ever done. But he'd withhold that fact from her to his dying day. She could burn him at the stake and he'd never utter those words in her presence. A man was ent.i.tled to his pride.

'Hey, you in there!' called Marty from the garden. 'Any chance of something to eat? My stomach's panicking; it thinks it's been stapled shut.'

They took their lunch down to the end of the garden, unlocked the rotting wooden gate and went and sat on the rickety bench that overlooked the ca.n.a.l. It was the most perfect spot, the main reason Will had bought the house. The house itself, as it was, left him cold. Modern but seriously dated, it was totally lacking in any character; it failed on all counts. But the location was superb and he could understand why the owners - clients of Marty's who in their retirement had now decided to settle in Geneva - had hung on to it for as long as they had. However, their loss was his gain and by the time he was finished with it, he'd have it transformed and ready to sell on for a tidy sum.

As if picking up on his thoughts, Marty said, 'Here's to you and your new home.' They tapped their cans of beer together. 'Cheers. So how do you think you'll like living here?'

'It'll do. Though it's tempting to nuke the house and start over.'

'I'll tell Marion and Joe you said that.'

'Tell them what you like. They should be rounded up and shot for having such appalling taste. Those hideous carpets and curtains can't have slipped your notice, surely? And as for that chocolate-brown bathroom suite ... that can be first to go in the skip.'

Marty laughed. 'Not everyone is blessed with such high-minded style as you. Besides, I thought retro was all the rage.'

'In lesser circles, maybe. But I'm a purist. Give me a fine pair of Queen Anne legs any day.'

'You antique dealers are all the same; just a bunch of screaming sn.o.bs.'

'You say the sweetest things.'

'I caught sight of one of your neighbours earlier. As natives go, she didn't look the sort to welcome you with open arms.'

'I expect she was in shock at the sight of you in those shorts.'

Marty looked down at his legs. 'What's wrong with them?'

'What's right with them? You look like that short fat guy from It Ain't Half Hot Mum. If you're not careful, you'll turn into your dad.'

'I'd rather turn into him than Peter Stringfellow.'

'So there's no middle ground? It's one or the other?'

'I didn't say that. But gravity and nasal hair come to us all. Even you, Will. It's time to give in. It's time to grow up.'

'Hey, this is not the talk I'd expect from a fine young blood. We're in our prime. The last time I checked, I had plenty of fuel left in the tank.'

'In our prime? We're forty-six, heading fast towards our pensions, arthritic joints and overactive bladders.'

'Speak for yourself. I'm only forty-five.'

'Bulls.h.i.t! You're forty-six next month.'

'So what's brought this on? Why the mood? Some young whippersnapper overtake your Merc in a souped-up Corsa?'

Marty looked glum and drank some more of his beer. 'Perhaps it's my turn now for the mid-life crisis.'

'Ah well, there's your mistake. You should have got it over and done with in your thirties, as I did. With all that behind me, the world looks pretty rosy from where I'm sitting.'

'Smug b.a.s.t.a.r.d.'

Will laughed. 'But a happy one.'

'You've never regretted it, then? Never thought what it might have been like if you'd kept your nerve and played the game?'

'Not once. If I'd stayed, the stress would have had me going on the rampage with a machete and wiping out the entire firm, and anyone else who got in the way. I know I made the right decision. Life's been b.l.o.o.d.y good to me since I opted out.'

'That's what I hate about you, Will; you're perpetually upbeat. You've no idea how sickening it is.'

Will threw a handful of crusts into the water, where they were instantly seized upon by a family of ducks. 'Come on, eat up; we've got the rest of my earthly goods and chattels to unpack.'

Chapter Six.

Marty left after he'd helped Will heave the last of the beds upstairs. There was a double in the main bedroom and two singles: one in the room that would be Gemma's and another in the room that would be Suzie's. These days the girls rarely stayed with him - Suzie was away at university and only home for the holidays - but it was important to Will that they knew they could stop over with him whenever they wanted to.

He liked to think that despite their differences, he and Maxine had done their best by the girls, that their divorce hadn't harmed them too much. It was possible, though, that he'd got it completely wrong and was fooling himself. Beneath the apparent acceptance, they might despise him as much as Maxine did. And as Maxine would have it, they had every reason to.

The affairs, none of which were of any real consequence, had been the final straw for Maxine. He wasn't proud of what he'd done and still cringed at the memory of the lies and skulking about he'd got up to; all those times he'd said, 'I'm just nipping out to clear my mind and stretch my legs.' Within minutes of leaving the house he'd be standing in a phone box that stank of urine - this was before the convenience of mobile phones - and arranging a meeting with the woman on the other end of the line. As red-hot phone s.e.x went, it was pretty pathetic.

It was also madness.

How he'd ever thought Maxine wouldn't see through him, he'd never know. He'd been out of his tiny mind.

Which wasn't far off the literal truth.

Officially, he'd had some kind of nervous breakdown. Unofficially, he'd just been a b.l.o.o.d.y idiot, had thrown away his promising career and when that was good and buried, he'd deliberately wrecked his marriage.

It was not the future he'd planned for himself, when, fresh out of law school with Marty, he had landed a plum of a training contract with Carlton Webb Davis, a top Manchester law firm. They'd both opted to work in Manchester rather than London, figuring that they'd soon become a pair of big fish in the small pond. But Will had another compelling reason to move back to the north-west where he'd grown up; he'd just met the most stunning girl. She lived in Cheshire and worked for her father, who ran an auction house in Maywood. They'd met during his last term at law school. He was home for the weekend, a few months after his dad had died and his mother was having a clear-out. She wanted to sell some of the furniture that had belonged to her mother-in-law, pieces she'd never much cared for. She hadn't been too keen on her mother-in-law, either. Will had arranged for a valuer to come to the house when he'd be around, just to ensure that his mother wouldn't be shafted by some smart-talking smoothie in a camel-coloured coat with rolls of cash stuffed into his pockets. In Will's opinion, antique dealers were right at the bottom of the food chain, along with politicians and second-hand car dealers. Coming from a lawyer, as was later pointed out to him, this was rich indeed.

Bang on ten o'clock, he'd opened the front door and got the surprise of his life. The attractive girl produced a business card: Maxine Stone, of Christopher Stone, Auctioneers and Valuers of Fine Art, Antique and Contemporary Items, Maywood, Cheshire.He stepped back to let her in, clocking at once that she was all curves and upmarket cla.s.s. She was top-notch totty; the kind of girl he always went for. It was something to do with flying in the face of his father's prejudice against the middle and upper cla.s.ses. But apart from that, Miss Maxine Stone was gorgeous. Almost as tall as him, and dressed in an impeccable black suit, her hair was tied back in a prim little bun, which he found wildly s.e.xy. She was looking him straight in the eye (hers were green) and smiling confidently. With a slim briefcase hanging from her left hand (no sign of an engagement ring), she held out her other hand. He shook hands with her and, conscious that he hadn't yet uttered a word, said, 'Can I take you out for dinner and then to bed for dynamite s.e.x?' That was what he wanted to say, but what he actually said was, 'Come on through; my mother's in the sitting room.'

His mother, always the perfect hostess, welcomed Maxine Stone as though she was a long-lost relative and bustled around making tea and arranging biscuits on a plate. It was some time before they got down to the meat of the matter - the fate of an ugly set of bedroom furniture - but Will didn't care. He couldn't take his eyes off this young woman. He reckoned she was about the same age as him, early twenties, and as she perched on the edge of the sofa with her elegant knees locked tight, he was mesmerised. Captivated. Slain. Call it what you will. He wanted her! He watched her face intently as she chatted amiably with his mother, who, if given the chance, could keep an unwary caller hostage for hours. Keep on talking, he willed his mother. Keep talking so that I can plan how to ask her out. 'Well, I find that hard to believe,' he suddenly heard his mother say. 'Don't you, Will?'

'Sorry,' he said, 'I was miles away.' He was mentally unpinning all that ash-blonde hair and running his fingers through it. 'What don't you believe, Mum?'

'That Maxine hasn't been snapped up by a handsome young man.' Only his mother could have been on first-name terms so soon with a complete stranger, openly enquiring about her marital status.

His eyes locked with Maxine's. 'Perhaps she's waiting for the right man,' he said as his mother went out to the kitchen to refill the teapot.

'Perhaps you're right,' Maxine said. 'Shall we go upstairs?'

'My, but you're a fast worker.'

'I was thinking of the bedroom furniture I'm here to value,' she said, her professional poise still firmly in place.

He smiled. 'So was I.' He got to his feet. 'I'll show you the way.'

'I'll bet you could, given half a chance.'

The room was practically zinging with their attraction for each other.

The wardrobe and dressing table were non-starters. 'Not the kind of thing we deal in, I'm afraid,' she apologised. 'I can recommend a man in Crewe who might be interested, though.'

More apologies flowed, this time from Will's mother, Ruby. 'I'm so sorry to have wasted your time. I wish I had something else to offer you instead.'

Two weeks later, when he'd come home for another weekend and was lying in bed with Maxine, he said, 'I know I'm a poor subst.i.tute for an ugly set of bedroom furniture, circa 1950S, but I do think we should do this more often.'

They were married two years later, after he'd finished his training contract and was fully qualified. Carlton Webb Davis made him an attractive offer and Maxine continued to work for her father, Christopher Stone. They were perfectly matched: both ambitious, both in a tearing hurry to make a name for themselves. For Maxine it was a foregone conclusion that she would take over her father's auction room and Will knew that she longed for that day to come. She didn't wish her father dead, but she did want him to retire and hand over the reins.

Meanwhile, things were really taking off for Will and he was climbing the greasy pole with chest-beating aplomb. It meant that he was rarely at home, but the more clients who kept him out till all hours, the more supportive Maxine was. Even when Suzie and Gemma came along, she never once complained that he wasn't there to change the nappies or read the bedtime stories. Not that she did a lot of that herself. They had help - a series of nannies whose names he could never keep up with. Maxine wasn't the easiest of employers and like him was rarely around to supervise them. The agency never minded; they had an endless supply of young Scandinavian and Spanish girls who were only in the country to learn English and have a good time.

As well as pursuing their careers, he and Maxine were climbing the property ladder and moved house as often as they could: it was all part of the master plan. His part in the plan, as a highly respected corporate lawyer, was to be the youngest ever senior partner at Carlton Webb Davis - not a bad ambition for a mere secondary-school boy who'd made good - and if anything was guaranteed to turn Maxine on, it was the thought of her man being the Big Cheese. The Numero Uno. The Honcho. Power, he came to realise, really was an aphrodisiac for her. She often joked that Lady Macbeth was her role model.

But when it all started to go wrong, when he began to morph from Superman into a snivelling burnt-out wreck, Lady Macbeth was not amused.

The day he realised he couldn't go on this way was one of the scariest moments of his life. For a while now he'd grown tired of sitting through sixteen-hour meetings just so that a roomful of t.o.s.s.e.rs could flex their egos. It was like being back in the school playground, seeing who had the biggest conkers. Then late one night, after he'd sat through ten hours of client argy-bargy - my conkers are bigger than yours - he had suddenly banged his fist on the table and said, 'Will you just sign the sodding contract and have done with it? Some of us have better things to do with our lives than jerk others about.' He'd gathered up his papers, thrown them into his briefcase and walked out of the boardroom.