Page 99 of The House on Sunset Lake

‘Mole? What mole? I can’t remember something I wrote in a first draft twenty-odd years ago.’

‘Jennifer Wyatt was your inspiration for Cecile, wasn’t she?’

‘Who’s Jennifer Wyatt?’ said Bryn, drinking more wine.

‘Don’t tell me you don’t remember,’ Jim said, his voice hardening.

‘The girl from Savannah?’ Bryn said finally.

‘You do remember. Jennifer Wyatt has a mole on the base of her spine,’ said Jim, feeling his anxiety heighten.

‘Well, good for Jennifer Wyatt. I assume you’ve been in contact during your stay in America. Close contact, it appears.’

‘Jennifer was your inspiration for Cecile, wasn’t she? I didn’t notice it at first, but when you have one part of the puzzle, the comparison becomes obvious.’

‘What puzzle?’ Bryn said with irritation.

‘Just admit it.’

His father’s cheeks were beginning to colour. Jim wasn’t sure whether it was from the claret, from shame or from anger.

‘I can’t remember who inspired every character in every story I’ve written. Maybe there’s a writer in you yet, son. Your imagination seems to have gone into overdrive.’

‘Bullshit!’ snapped Jim. ‘You write about a beautiful young girl with a mole exactly the same as the girl who was living in the house next door – that’s supposed to be coincidence? Tell me, Dad!’ he said through gritted teeth. ‘I need to know.’

‘What?’ growled Bryn, turning his familiar aggression on his son.

‘Jennifer was your inspiration for Cecile. And you knew she had a mole in an intimate place. Tell me how you knew that.’

‘What are you saying, James? You want to know if I screwed her?’

‘Just admit it!’ roared Jim.

They both fell silent for a moment. The pressure in the room seemed to pop like a balloon that had been blown too full.

‘Sure, I screwed her,’ Bryn said, leaning back against the countertop and folding his arms in front of him. ‘Is that what you needed to know?’

Jim blinked, feeling all the rage drain from him. Only moments ago he had wanted to strike his father; now he felt like he himself had been punched in the gut. He perched on a stool, his hands falling limp in his lap.

‘Jim . . .’ said Bryn. ‘God, son. I didn’t know how strongly you felt for the girl. I thought you were just friends, that’s what you told me and your mother a dozen times.’

Jim looked at him. ‘So that made it OK? It made her fair game for you?’

He closed his eyes and felt his head swim. When he opened them again, his father actually looked contrite.

‘Look, I’m not proud of myself, but she made herself available to me, and I took advantage of that.’

‘So it was all Jennifer . . .’

‘She’d come to the Lake House, looking for you if I remember. I was in the boathouse, she came in, we started chatting about something or other. Wasn’t she doing some documentary? And, well, one thing led to another.’

Jim shook his head with fury.

‘I don’t believe it,’ he hissed under his breath.

‘What don’t you believe, Jim? That a twenty-something woman actually found me attractive?’

Of course he could believe that. His mother’s constant vaguely anxious expression was the result of living for fifty years with a man that all other women were attracted to. And he couldn’t deny he’d been jealous of the way he had seen Jennifer look at his father. The way she hung on his every word. It was easy to be seduced by Bryn Johnson. Very easy.