Page 38 of The Love Game

Stuart recognised her when she returned to Garland and Sons funeral directors the following morning.

‘Miss Spencer,’ he said.

She pulled the paperwork her mother had supplied her with from her bag.

‘I’d like to collect my grandmother’s ashes please,’ she said. ‘Monica Spencer.’

Stuart looked down at the certificates and reached for his ledger. ‘I think these are all in order,’ he said, reaching for his pen.

She watched as he inscribed the ledger with the details from Monica’s death certificate.

Back at home, her mother had pressed it into her shaking hands, tearful as she explained that, although there had been a small ceremony for her mother in the family church, Henry had chosen to leave Monica’s actual ashes in Swallow Beach because it was the place she’d loved most in the world.

Vi watched Stuart scrutinise the paperwork and then complete a detailed entry in his book, pulling out a red stamp to annotate the ashes as collected.

She held her breath as he pressed the stamp into the ink and then stamped it firmly in the box, feeling a sense of relief that Monica wasn’t going to spend even one more night unclaimed.

‘Will you require any assistance to arrange an internment ceremony, Miss Spencer?’

Vi paused, then realised he was referring to a burial of the ashes. ‘Oh, no thank you. No. I’ve got all of that in hand already, thank you.’

Clutching the ashes to her chest like precious cargo, she turned and left the undertakers.

When Violet arrived back at the pier half an hour later, Lucy asked if everyone on site could gather in her studio as soon as possible.

‘I’m leaving,’ she said. ‘This morning. Now. I’m sorry to drop this on you all like this, and Vi, I’ll pay three months’ rent or something to give you time to re-let this place, but I have to go right now.’

‘What’s happened?’ Violet said, frightened because it was clear from Lucy’s face and demeanour that something was seriously wrong. Her usually made-up face was makeup free, and her dark curls had been hurriedly dragged back into a ponytail.

Lucy looked towards the door. ‘My ex-husband has found us.’ She glanced around the room from face to confused face. ‘For those of you who don’t know, and why would you, Ian’s a violent bastard of a man, and the only reason he’s come for me is to cause trouble.’

‘Oh shit,’ Vi murmured, worried for Lucy and Charlie.

‘What do you mean, he’s found you?’ Keris asked, urgent. ‘Has he hurt you, Luce? Because the police …’

‘No, he hasn’t. I haven’t seen him, but he’s made sure I know he’s here.’ Lucy shuddered. ‘He was in my house yesterday while I was out. He left yellow roses in my kitchen as a calling card, the only flowers he ever bought me, usually to say sorry for the last beating.’

‘Christ,’ Keris said.

‘So what, you’re just going to run away?’ Beau said, clearly furious. ‘Wait for him to catch up with you in the next place, then run again?’

‘What else do you suggest?’ Lucy said, her voice rising.

‘I was foolish enough to think he’d moved on with his life, but he’s not that kind of man.

He’s vindictive. I can only think that he found that photo of me in the local paper on the internet and tracked me down.

He has to win, and I’m not going to hang around and let him get to Charlie. ’

‘Where is Charlie?’ Vi asked.

‘He’s in my room,’ Beau said, shaking his head. Lucy leaving was obviously news to him as much as anyone else, and Vi could see him getting more and more furious.

‘I can’t believe the fucker was in your house,’ he said. ‘You should have called me.’

Lucy looked distressed. ‘And put you in danger too? While I’m here, none of you are safe. He’s small-minded, vengeful. I spent enough years living in fear of him to know that he’ll try to get at me through anyone he thinks I’m close to.’

‘This isn’t the right thing to do, Lucy,’ Cal said. ‘If you go, you’re letting him win.’

‘And if I stay, he might kill me. Or worse, Charlie.’

Vi looked at Lucy. ‘And if you go, he still might. You’ll be forever looking over your shoulder. You can’t live like that, it’s intolerable.’

‘Don’t you think that’s how I’ve lived since the day I left him?’ Lucy scrubbed her hands over her face, resigned. ‘Charlie was in the house when he came, Vi. When I think what could have happened to my boy …’ She trailed off, stony-faced, determined.

Vi didn’t know what to say, how to help, but she couldn’t let Lucy deal with this on her own.

‘No,’ she said, standing up. ‘Come and stay with me at the Lido for a few days, just while we think what to do.’

Beau shook his head. ‘You stay with me.’

Cal looked at Beau, aware that he was renting a one-room studio. ‘It makes more sense if you stay at mine,’ he said, glancing back at Lucy. ‘I’ve got more room.’

‘Look, all of you, stop,’ Lucy said. ‘I can’t involve you all like this. It’s my problem, and I’m dealing with it.’

‘You’re our friend, Lucy,’ Vi said. ‘And we want to help. You don’t have to handle everything on your own any more.’

‘Run, and he’ll run too,’ Keris said.

‘Stay, and I’ll make sure the bastard regrets rearing his ugly head within a hundred miles of you. You’ll be free of him for good,’ Beau said, crossing to stand beside Lucy, almost comically tall beside her five-foot-nothing frame.

Vi watched Lucy’s shoulders drop, and then she crumbled, starting to cry. Keris jumped up and ushered her over to sit between them on the chaise, and Beau hunkered down on his haunches and put his hands on her knees.

‘Look at me,’ he said. ‘I’m practically the Hulk.’

‘You don’t know what he’s capable of.’

‘And you don’t know what I’m capable of,’ Beau said. ‘I grew up around a man like him. I know his kind, I’m not one bit scared of him. Stay and I’ll protect you.’

‘We all will,’ Vi said, squeezing Lucy’s shoulders. ‘We’ve all got your back.’

Slowly, Lucy nodded. ‘You’re the best friends I’ve ever had,’ she said.

Beau looked up at Cal. ‘Looks like you’ve got yourself some lodgers.’

‘Have my place instead,’ Keris offered. ‘I’ll just move into Grandpa’s spare room for a while.’

And so it was set. Lucy, Charlie and Beau would move into the ground floor of the Lido, and her friends would throw a ring of steel around her until her cockroach ex-husband crawled out from beneath his rock, at which point Beau would take great pleasure in crushing him beneath his boot.

They settled into a routine of sorts over the week that followed.

Lucy had told Charlie just enough for him to understand the gravity of the situation but not scare him witless, and Cal and Beau worked it out between them so one of them was always visibly present on the pier during the day.

It bonded them all more tightly together in a strange way, with the exception of Melvin and Linda who were away in Arizona on a couple connection retreat – whatever that was.

On Friday morning, they held a final run-through of the plans for the Good Sex awards the following evening.

‘So all you really need to do is be on hand just in case there are any logistical questions from the event management team. They’ll arrive here by twelve o’clock tomorrow. They’re like ninjas – trust me, by four o’clock they’ll have the pier Oscar ready.’

Vi nodded. The awards hadn’t really inconvenienced her at all.

Beau was right about the event company – they’d been on site earlier in the week measuring up, and having met them she was rather looking forward to seeing what they were going to do.

There were to be a dozen round dinner tables set out along the pier and live music, professional caterers and a compere to run the evening.

Fireworks had been planned as the grand finale, a spectacular sight to round off what would hopefully be a wonderful night.

The only thing Vi had taken care of herself was hiring an electrician to come and festoon the pier with fairy lights, and she’d agreed to be on site in the birdcage just in case they needed her.

Beau and Cal were both attending in their professional capacities, and the plan was for Lucy to come as Beau’s plus one while Charlie hung out in the birdcage with Vi.

As plans went, it was pretty watertight.

The downside for Violet of Keris decamping to her grandpa’s apartment was that it had made getting Barty alone nigh on impossible.

He revelled in having his granddaughter as a temporary flatmate, cooking up a storm of carrot cake to send over to the pier and planning their evenings around cinema trips, dinners and theatre outings.

Keris half-heartedly complained that he was monopolising all of her time, but in that affectionate way that said she was indulging him and didn’t really mind.

In truth, Violet was almost relieved. She knew she had to speak to Barty, but she had no clue how to raise the fact that she knew he’d lied to her, or even what she was going to gain by doing so.

She didn’t need him to confirm he was T, she knew that much already.

It was more visceral than that; she needed to hear that Barty had loved her gran, that she hadn’t died desolate and lonely because he’d spurned her and the baby.

Vi checked her watch. It was just after lunch; Keris would be busy front of house in the birdcage for a couple of hours yet at least. Seizing the chance, she picked up her bag and headed for the Lido.

‘Violet, my child!’ Barty’s face cracked into his trademark wicked smile when he opened the door and found her there a few minutes later. ‘Time for a mint tea?’

She smiled, tight and fraught, nodding. ‘Sounds good.’

She hadn’t actually been inside Barty’s apartment up to then.

It was unsurprisingly different from her own, and different from Cal’s too.

Simple and traditional, full of photographs and mementos from a long, colourful life.

While Barty busied himself in the kitchen, Vi studied the collection of framed photos on the fireplace.