Page 24 of The Love Game

‘This should do it,’ Cal said, walking back through from his workshop with a thin metal rod, then coming to an almost comical halt as he took in the sight of his mother framed in the doorway staring at Violet through the bars of the cage and Keris trying to hide behind Beau’s bulk in her feather dancing girl kit.

‘What in God’s name is going on here?’ Gladys practically roared, thundering into the middle of the room.

Swinging around to the photographer, she waved her arms, her briefcase perilously close to taking his camera out.

‘Get it all on film! Especially that girl in the cage like an animal! Good God, I thought I’d seen it all but this takes the biscuit! ’

Cal rolled his eyes, handing Violet the rod through the bars.

‘What are you doing now? Poking her? Is that what you’re doing, poking her with a stick? Is that part of the ritual? This is illegal, I’m sure of it!’ she shouted, then stooped down to look at Violet as if she were an exhibit in a zoo. ‘I was right about you, young lady.’

Violet knew she should get out and attempt to smooth the situation, but on the other hand, Gladys was ten minutes early and she was never early, and if she didn’t get that key now it would as good as likely fall through the boards.

So instead of doing the sensible thing, gripped with the absurdity of the situation, she clutched the bars and sort of growled.

‘Did you just …’ Gladys backed away. ‘She’s feral. I knew it. Calvin, enough is enough. This whole thing is a debacle.’

Keris put her hands on her hips to say something indignant, and Gladys turned to her all guns blazing.

‘And you ought to know better than to get sucked into a cult like this, Keris Harwood,’ she declared. ‘Although with a mother like yours, it was always on the cards.’

Keris’s face turned the colour of the scarlet feathers on her corset. ‘Don’t you dare talk ill of my family, Gladys Dearheart. At least we can still stand the sight of each other. I doubt your lot would piss on you if you were on fire!’

Violet felt almost sorry for Gladys for a moment; her eyes shot to Cal for back-up, and to be fair he did look conflicted, but being her own worst enemy Gladys ploughed on and made things a million times worse.

‘I said this place would be turned into a place of ill repute, and I was right. You can’t come here and peddle your filth to good people like us from the safety of your dog cage, young woman.’ She slapped her hand down on the top of the cage for effect, making it rattle.

Beau, who so far had held his tongue on the sidelines, stepped forward in front of the cage.

‘It’s not a dog cage, ma’am,’ he said. ‘It’s a handmade artisan fetish cage of the highest quality.’ He looked over Gladys’s shoulder and smiled genially into the lens of the cameraman. ‘Available on request in a variety of sizes.’

He’d probably just forgotten about his ripped T-shirt, nor realised that Gladys was eye level with his nipple.

‘Call your gigolo off! Keris, now!’ Gladys squawked, shielding her eyes from the sight of so much man.

‘Are you suggesting I pay men for sex, Gladys?’ Keris said, her boobs jiggling around because she was hopping mad.

‘If the cap fits!’

Melvin and Linda hovered in the background, and at this Linda raised her hand tentatively. ‘I think I can interject here. Keris most certainly isn’t paying any man for sex.’

Keris nodded at the support from an unexpected source.

‘I know this,’ Linda nodded, ‘because I recently found out that Keris is in fact a lesbian.’

All eyes swung to Linda, who put both hands up and smiled. ‘Not that that’s anything to be ashamed of or applauded, it just is what it is and I thought it might help diffuse the gigolo confusion.’ She adjusted her silk turban. ‘As you were.’

‘I’m going to need a lot of therapy to get over this,’ Gladys muttered, backing towards the door.

‘Our rates are very reasonable,’ Melvin said, withdrawing his business card from his shirt pocket and holding it out. Gladys narrowed her eyes, and he tucked it slowly away with a shrug. ‘Classic case of sexual repression,’ he muttered as an aside to Linda.

Gladys stomped off down the pier, her sensible heels clattering, just as Lucy appeared, her camera around her neck.

‘Any sign of that coffee machine yet? I could kill for a cappuccino.’

Later that night, Violet curled up on the bed and cried.

She cried with frustration, and with annoyance, and because she felt well and truly out of her depth in just about every aspect of her life.

Bloody sodding Gladys Dearheart had got exactly what she wanted that afternoon; if the rest of Swallow Beach hadn’t been taking the Mayoress seriously up to now, they’d listen up once she backed up her wild claims with photographic evidence of depravity on the pier.

What had she been thinking of, growling?

Honestly, she felt like a complete and utter fool.

She’d retired with the rest of the team to The Swallow for a restorative drink after work, and despite the fact that they’d all seen the humorous side, she was finding it harder to raise a smile.

But then it wasn’t their pier; they weren’t responsible for honouring Monica’s memory.

She felt so shoddy, as if she’d somehow disrespected her grandmother.

‘I’m sorry,’ she whispered, and her fingers curled around something underneath her pillow.

Monica’s diary. She held it against her heart, trying to feel closer to the woman who’d written it.

Just knowing that Monica had held it, touched the pages, made her feel slightly better, a little more connected.

And then, although she felt some misgivings about invading her gran’s privacy, she opened it and started to read.

She just hoped her gran would understand she was reading it to feel closer to her rather than to snoop.

February had blown in on a cold wind, Monica said.

She missed Della now she was in school full-time, and Henry was away so much on business that she was unbearably lonely sometimes.

She knew it was no excuse, mind – and although she didn’t specify what for, exactly, Violet had the distinct impression that it was to do with the mysterious T.

Was he the guy in the newspaper photograph?

Despite Barty’s suggestion of a trick of the light, Violet had studied the image again and decided the man in the photo was slightly too tall, and definitely too dark-haired to be her grandpa.

Was Barty lying, she wondered? Not that she thought he’d have a malicious reason to do so, more that he might be protecting a friend, or just felt that the past was best left undisturbed.

Or maybe he simply didn’t know, and genuinely thought it could be Henry.

T gave me a shell bracelet today , Monica wrote on Valentine’s day. He made it himself from shells on the beach. Isn’t that the most romantic thing ever? I can’t seem to stay away from him, even though I know it’s dangerous for all of us.

Violet closed her eyes, her heart breaking for both Monica and her Grandpa Henry.

She was in no position to judge her grandmother – who really knew anything about other people’s marriages?

But it was becoming more and more clear to Violet – her grandmother had been having an affair before she died in 1978.

At just after midnight, Violet’s mobile vibrated on the bedside table. She wasn’t sleeping yet, and reached for it, concerned that something might be wrong at home. But the message wasn’t from her mum – it was from Cal.

You asleep, mermaid girl?

She lay in the dark, reading and re-reading his words. No. Not yet. You? She smiled softly as she sent it.

Don’t let today upset you. It won’t make any difference in the grand scheme of things.

Vi sighed, finding it hard not to feel the weight of the day on her bones. Just feeling a bit rubbish about things tonight she sent.

He didn’t reply for a few minutes. In fact he didn’t reply at all – he tapped on her door lightly, just loud enough to hear. Violet looked down at her PJs, a bit panicked.

‘Hang on,’ she whisper-shouted. ‘I’m coming.’

Opening her door a minute later, she found him barefoot in jeans and a T-shirt.

‘Special delivery,’ he said, holding something out to her. ‘I made it for you to say sorry for my mother being a right real pain in the bloody arse.’

She looked down at the delicate ribbon of leather in his hand. Heather-grey, set with five tiny seashells interspersed along its length.

‘Oh my God,’ she whispered. ‘Cal …’ He didn’t know of course. He didn’t understand how spookily reminiscent this was of Monica’s diary. ‘It’s so pretty.’

Stepping back, she opened her door a little wider. ‘Come in for a while?’

He looked once behind him towards his door, and then made up his mind and followed her into her hallway.

Violet led him through to the lounge. ‘Coffee?’ she said. ‘Or I have some brandy.’

He nodded, standing in the bay window. ‘Brandy.’

She poured them a couple of good measures, and then sank down on the sofa with one leg curled underneath her. She’d pulled her hair up hastily into a band on the way to answer the door, and her black, wide-necked pineapple-print top kept sliding off her shoulder.

‘Thanks,’ he said, coming to sit on the sofa beside her, accepting the tumbler she held out.

The brandy scorched her throat, deep rich heat that helped calm her nerves. ‘Thank you for the bracelet,’ she said, looking down at it on her wrist. It really was lovely.

‘It was the closest shade to violet I could find in my stock,’ he said, almost bashful.

His thoughtfulness touched her. ‘You don’t need to apologise for your mum,’ she said. ‘It’s not your fault, and I didn’t do myself any favours,’ she sighed, regretting that growl for the hundredth time.

‘I thought growling was inspired, in the circumstances,’ Cal laughed softly. ‘You surprised me.’