Chapter 13: What He Never Read

Alistair held out his hand, and I put the phone into it.

He read standing up, with his dinner jacket still buttoned and snow melting on his shoulders.

His thumb moved slowly down the long thread with my name at the top.

He stopped at one line and his mouth shifted.

"I'm glad you're happy. Don't make a fuss," he said. "I would never write that. I don't use the word fuss."

"I know," I said.

"You've had that on your phone for months."

"I've had it on mine," I said. "I thought you'd written it."

He opened the folder marked V - read and went through it without a word.

I watched his face the whole time, waiting for the but.

It didn't come.

When he reached the last message, he pressed his fist against his mouth and kept it there.

Then he found the clinic voicemail and played it once, with the phone against his ear.

Margaret did not move or speak. She stood by the desk with her handbag held in both hands.

"The Tuesday," Alistair said at last. His voice was rough. "When you rang me from the taxi."

"Yes."

"Bryony came into my office at nine that morning. She said you'd had a bad week and might ring and tell me it was an emergency."

"Did she say what kind?"

"She said you'd say you were bleeding." He looked up. "I heard you say it, and I thought: here it is, exactly as she said."

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