Page 49 of The Work Husband

‘You stay away from Sam.’ I was surprised by the intensity of my reaction. ‘He might be a cheating dickhead, but he’s my cheating dickhead.’

Jamie grinned, happy that he’d managed, albeit briefly, to cheer me up.

‘You know,’ he said, ‘it might seem all doom and gloom right now. But there’s one good thing that might come out of this.’

‘What’s that?’

His eyes rested on my face. ‘I shouldn’t really go there. Not while you’re all broken-hearted and distraught.’

‘Go where?’ I couldn’t resist asking.

‘If you kick Sam to the kerb, I get to have a crack at you myself. I mean, look at you. Who wouldn’t?’

Now I laughed. ‘Come on, Jamie. Don’t be mad.’

‘If you can’t even see the appeal of that,’ he said grumpily, ‘then clearly you still love him.’

‘I never said I didn’t.’

‘Then keep your powder dry. Don’t do anything rash just yet. We’re going to come up with a plan – at least, I am.’

He pushed back his chair and stood up, and after a moment I followed him. My situation seemed every bit as bleak as it had that morning, but still, Jamie had made me feel slightly better. I had no idea what plan he could possibly think up – things had surely gone beyond salvageable.

But in my wildest nightmares, I could never have imagined what was going through his mind as we walked slowly back to the office.

TWENTY-FOUR

Jamie might not have told me what he was planning – he might not even have known himself. But one thing was for sure: his timing couldn’t have been worse if he’d tried.

It was Thursday evening. I’d spent the past three days barely able to eat or sleep, going through the motions at work, relieved that Sam was working flat-out on a deadline that kept him in the co-working space where he spent his days until late enough in the evening that I could justify already being in bed by the time he arrived home.

I’d looked under the bed for the jeans I’d concealed there, but evidently Sam had got there first – I’d found them in the washing basket, the pockets empty and Ava’s letter nowhere to be seen.

Perhaps I’d hallucinated the whole thing. Perhaps I truly was descending into paranoia, imagining things that weren’t there. But when I closed my eyes, I could see that page in front of me as clearly as if it was actually there: the gold border on the paper, the faint pattern on its surface, Ava’s rounded violet writing, Sam’s name at the beginning of the first page and hers at the foot of the second.

I knew it had been real. My fears were justified, and I hadn’t even had the chance to speak to Jamie again about the situation – Rosie-Mae had relented, Trent’s wedding was back on and he’d been working flat-out with the team of wedding planners and Trent’s agent to un-cancel all the bookings that Rosie-Mae’s team had cancelled.

So I realised I was going to have to revert to plan A, confront Sam and tell him what I’d seen, and hope against hope that there was some perfectly innocent explanation for the letter after all.

Except I couldn’t imagine what such an explanation might be.

When Sam arrived home that evening, I was sitting inside the flat. The spell of roasting-hot weather had broken, and rain was coming down in sheets, darkening the evening by eight o’clock, steaming off the sun-baked pavements and thundering on the overhang of the flat above’s balcony.

After days of salads I’d been too stressed to eat, I’d made a macaroni cheese for dinner, and I was removing it from the oven, its surface golden and bubbling, when Sam walked in through the door.

Clearly, he hadn’t checked the weather forecast that morning. His T-shirt was soaked through with rain, his shorts clinging to his thighs, his nylon laptop bag dripping on the wooden floor.

‘Sheesh, I needed an ark to get home.’ He left a trail of wet footprints as he crossed the flat to greet me. ‘I’ll just change into something dry.’

‘Okay.’ I put the mac and cheese down on the counter and fetched two plates from the cupboard.

Then he paused, still dripping, and looked at me. ‘Are you okay? That migraine must surely have gone by now. Or do you need to see a doctor? You don’t look…’

I knew only too well how I didn’t look. Every mirror I passed had revealed dark shadows under my eyes, a large spot practically creating its own force field on my chin and flaky skin on my lips.

‘I’m all right,’ I said. ‘Just… you know. I’ve been kind of stressed.’

Sam peeled off his top and shorts and put them straight into the washing machine. He looked at me for a moment, shivered slightly in the cool breeze coming from the open balcony door, then said, ‘Hold on.’