Page 14 of A Secret Scottish Escape

David nodded again and pressed his lips together. “I did tell him I thought he was being ridiculous on more than one occasion, and then he said he would tell you – but obviously, he never got around to it.”

I felt as though I were being swallowed by a huge, dark shadow. I didn’t know Mac at all.

I jumped out of my seat, my legs swaying in my heels. I wanted to get away from here; I didn’t want to be anywhere near that letter. “I told you. I don’t want that money. I don’t even want the memories I have of him.”

David rose to his feet and straightened his tie. “Layla, I know this must all have come as a terrible shock to you.”

“That’s an understatement. You cannot begin to imagine what is going on in my head right now.”

David sighed and thrust his hands into his suit pockets. “I know this must be a hell of a lot to digest, especially today, but Mac insisted that you be told at his funeral. He didn’t want Hannah getting wind of any of this.”

“He didn’t want Hannah getting wind of what, exactly?”

I spun round on my heel. Oh no. She must have been listening around the corner.

She barrelled towards David and me in her ostentatious hat.

I reached for Mac’s letter and stuffed it into my jacket pocket. I didn’t want her seeing it.

“This is a private conversation, Hannah,” said David. “I was planning to speak to you next week.”

“Next week? What is this? It’s not a bloody bus queue!”

David frowned and lowered his voice. “Can’t you exhibit a modicum of decency? It is Mac’s funeral, after all.”

Hannah folded her bony arms and eyed me. “Well, I want to know what’s going on. I bet certain people will do very well out of Mac’s demise.”

I turned back to David. “I don’t want it. I don’t want anything from Mac. Not anymore.”

Hannah’s nostrils flared out of her heavily made-up face. “I was his wife for twenty odd years. I have a right to know what the hell is going on here.”

David shot me a questioning gaze, and I nodded. It made no difference to me now, anyway. And after the emotional demands of the funeral, the last thing I needed was one of Hannah’s melodramatic meltdowns in full public view.

David indicated for Hannah to sit down and she tilted her powdered chin up in triumph.

I could feel my body stiffen as I sat again. I kept my watery gaze focused on David across the table. I had seen enough of Hannah’s long nose and pinched mouth to last me the next forty years.

When he told her about Mac leaving me all current and future royalties from his novels, her nails reached for the dangly bracelet dripping from her wrist. Her appalled expression twisted from me to David. “But that’s ridiculous,” she spluttered. “There must be some mistake.”

She opened and closed her mouth for a few moments, inwardly processing what David had just told her. “That’s an extortionate amount of money. Why the hell would he leave it all to you?” I could see her chest rising and falling. Her voice was growing bitter. “No, that can’t be right. What did Mac leave to me?”

David settled back on the other quilted couch. “You’ll recall that Mac owned an estate in northern France. He has bequeathed that to you.”

Hannah was blinking so furiously, I thought she’d developed a nervous twitch. “You call that apartment an estate? It’s in a state, more like! It’s as big as a minute!”

“It’s well maintained and in a good location,” replied David evenly. “If you don’t wish to keep it, I’m sure you’ll be able to sell it quickly.”

Hannah swung her curtain of bobbed hair towards me. She couldn’t contain her fury. “So I get a pokey flat with a rusty balcony and she gets her hands on all his royalties. This is ludicrous!”

She threw her head back, almost losing her hat. “That estate, as you call it, was Mac’s first writing retreat. It’s a sodding bug hole!”

“I think that’s an exaggeration, don’t you?” asked David.

Hannah glowered under the brim of her designer hat.

I had never been to the northern France flat, but Mac had shown me photos of it. It was a modest, cream and beige balconied affair close to a main street and a public park.

Mac had been able to afford it at the time thanks to his redundancy package as a political columnist for one of the London broadsheets, and it was there that he had written his first two novels.