In Her Eyes by Sarah Alderson (ebook reader for pc and android TXT) 📕

She looks at me pityingly and I have to turn away, shoving past them both and heading back inside the ICU.

The linoleum floor shimmers in front of my eyes. All these puzzle pieces I never even knew were puzzle pieces start to slot into place, the picture becoming clear: the insurance troubles here at the hospital; Robert’s increasing stress over the last few months; the way he’s been locking himself away every night in his study; the fact that last week Javier approached me about not having been paid for two months . . . I dismissed it, putting it down to Robert just being forgetful, being caught up in work. I’ve been so goddamn blind. And so damn smug at the same time. Thinking I knew everything that was going on in my family – that everyone told me everything. Why did I think I was the only one who had secrets?

Chapter 18

Robert looks up at me, hunkered over himself like a child being scolded. ‘I’m sorry,’ he says.

‘Sorry?’ I say blankly.

‘I didn’t want to worry you.’ Robert bows his head, dropping it into his hands.

I collapse down onto the sofa opposite him. I can’t bring myself to sit anywhere near him, rage bubbles through my veins so hot that I can almost see the steam rising off my skin. The whole way home in the car I tried not to let my anger get the better of me. I told myself to stay calm but now I’m confronting him all that goes out the window. ‘You didn’t think I had a right to know?’ I shout.

He glances at me through the slits between his fingers. ‘I thought I had it under control.’

I can’t look at him. If I look at him I might launch myself across the coffee table and start pummeling his already injured face. I look around the living room instead. ‘The house. Are we going to lose the house?’ I ask.

I am surprised at how calm I sound. I think it’s because it all feels so unreal. It’s like trying to understand basic math and then being told to wrap your head around quantum physics. I was struggling to deal with the break-in and what’s happened to June. Now this on top . . . it’s too much to process. I press my hands to my throbbing temples.

‘The bank already owns the house,’ Robert mutters. ‘It’s not ours anymore.’

‘But we paid cash for it,’ I stammer, wondering how on earth someone can fritter away close to three million dollars, which is what the house is worth.

‘I had debts. The business . . . The app I’ve been working on. I poured a lot into it. And . . . I made some stupid investments.’ He mumbles this last part.

‘In what?’ I ask, anger giving way to stupefaction.

‘In some start-ups.’

I groan and rub a hand over my eyes. I’m trapped inside a nightmare. Who is this man sitting opposite me? This man with the haggard expression, livid bruises and pouches under his eyes isn’t familiar to me at all. He’s a complete stranger, I realize with a shock. I can’t even remember the last time I really looked at him, let alone the last time I really spoke to him, about anything beyond the children or everyday nonsense. When did it get like this? How did I not notice the giant fissure between us?

But deep down I know the answer to that question. It’s been at least eighteen months that we’ve been drifting apart and I’m surely to blame, at least for half of it. But not for this. What Robert’s done is unforgivable.

‘Surely there’s something left,’ I say.

He doesn’t reply.

‘Our 401s?’ I ask.

He shakes his head.

‘You gambled away our pensions?’ I hiss.

‘Yes,’ he mumbles.

I try to gather a breath but the room tilts violently on its axis.

‘My inheritance?’ I ask quietly.

He gives a shake of the head.

‘The kids’ college funds?’

He shakes his head again.

Rage spirals up inside me and I have to clamp my jaw shut to stop it corkscrewing its way out.

‘I’m sorry,’ he mumbles.

Sorry?! That inheritance was my money, gifted to me by my grandparents after they died. Not much, but I’d been setting it aside, hoping to use it one day to help the kids get their feet on the property ladder, or to pay for an extravagant family holiday when I turned fifty . . . or to start a new business, maybe open my own art gallery in town. I don’t even know. But the point is, it was my money. Not his. And if he’s spent the college fund, what will happen to Hannah? How will we afford to pay for her tuition? Or June’s?

‘How could you be so damn stupid?’ I shout. I stand up. Bone tired, with every muscle in my body aching as if I’ve done twelve rounds in a boxing ring, I walk towards the door because I cannot be in this space with him for one more second.

‘Where are you going?’ Robert calls after me.

‘Back to the hospital.’

‘We need to pack,’ he says.

I wheel around. ‘Excuse me?’

‘The bank is foreclosing on the house.’

I close my eyes and take another deep breath. Keep calm. Keep it all inside. There’s no point in losing it. It’s beyond that now. ‘Did you talk to them?’ I ask. ‘Did you explain? How can they expect us to move with everything else that’s happening? Where are we supposed to go?’

‘They’ve given us an extra week. But we were meant to be out months ago.’

I stare at him. ‘Months ago?’ Is he joking? He looks at me with a hangdog expression. Apparently not. All that time. And he never once thought to tell me what was going on. ‘You got us into this mess,’ I finally say and walk out the door.

Laurie is waiting for me outside.

‘Are you OK?’ she asks when I climb in her car.

I shake my head. Laurie thankfully doesn’t say anything more. She starts driving, slowing to navigate her way through the cluster of news crews gathered at the gate to