The Dinner Guest by B Walter (best short books to read txt) 📕

have had. Her strict Catholic upbringing caused her to refuse to believe she had an illegitimate grandson out there in the world.

Years would go by before I would scroll through my old hard drive, about to be discarded, and stumble upon my photos from 2005. When I would realise what I had actually photographed, that day in the woods. How I had shot a clear view of Johnny and Collette’s cabin. The figure in the hot tub on the deck. And the man standing over him. The man in a cream cable-knit jumper.

Chapter Forty-One Charlie

Less than a week to go

Matthew continued to tell me his horrible story as I sat on the sofa with balled-up fists. How Rachel had joined him, the Gibsons, and their friends. How he hadn’t really spoken to her, how she’d blended into the group of university friends the Gibsons had brought. He barely remembered seeing her. Now, he realised that she must have gone over there with a similar aim to his: to check on her sibling, make sure they weren’t relapsing into old habits, and hope for their safe return home. After he’d said all this, it was enough for me to put two and two together.

‘This is why she’s been trying to get close to Titus. This is why she’s been so weird. So keen to worm her way into our family, into our lives. And you, with your weird encouragement of her. So fucking naïve. And Christ, she struck gold, didn’t she, living off Meryl’s money over on Eaton Place.’

‘Eaton Square,’ he corrected.

‘I don’t give a fuck!’ I was shouting now. ‘How long have you known? How much danger has Titus been in while you’ve been keeping all your secrets close to your chest?’

‘I only found out today. She confronted me. That’s why we had to leave the party so quickly. I couldn’t be anywhere near her. I can’t be anywhere near her. That’s why I’m telling you all this … because of what she might do.’

I ran a stressful hand through my hair. ‘What can she do? What did she say to you?’

Matthew looked very close to tears now, and as he reached a slightly shaking hand for his drink on the mantelpiece, I saw some tears slip from his eyes. ‘She has a photograph. A photograph of me. Standing on the veranda. And Johnny’s sitting in the hot tub. And I’m standing there, holding Titus. Watching him.’

I pinched the bridge of my nose, trying to take in oxygen slowly. ‘And what is she going to do with this photograph? Try to go to the police? Blackmail us?’

I looked up at him shaking his head. ‘I don’t know. I was too sick to say anything. I just knew I had to get away from her.’

‘And she’s worked out the truth, has she?’

I saw a flicker of something in his face. He looked down, then back up to me, but there was an odd lack of focus in his gaze. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘She thinks I could have saved him.’

I got up. I’d had enough. I couldn’t have taken any more even if I’d wanted to. I was both exhausted yet so pumped with adrenalin I felt I could run a mile.

‘Where are you going?’

‘Out.’

He followed me to the hallway as I stepped into my shoes. ‘Please. Can we talk about this?’ He was properly crying now. And part of me wanted to comfort him. Wanted to gather him into my arms. Allow him to cry into my shoulder. But another part of me was on fire with a much darker, less forgiving emotion. It’s how I always feel if I’m betrayed, deceived, left out of a loop. And this was one big fucking loop he’d left me out of. I took one last glance at the flushed, tear-stained face of my husband. Then I stepped out of the house, letting the door slam behind me.

I walked out onto the main road and along its steady curve up to Sloane Square. I didn’t have any real destination in mind. No real direction. I just knew I had to walk. I only came to a stop once I reached Eaton Square. I didn’t know Meryl’s house number off by heart, but I slowed when I got to the part of the long, neat street where I thought she lived. Rachel was in one of these houses right now, assuming they’d already returned from the party. I could knock on the doors until I found her. Demand to know her side of the story. But I knew this was foolish. So I turned away and carried on walking. I passed garden squares. Houses with darkened windows. Busy late-night bars, loud with drunken merriment. Armed police officers outside embassies. I passed my mother’s house on Wilton Crescent. I didn’t think, I didn’t dwell, I purposefully shut everything out as best I could, letting my feet take me away through the warm night. When I was in the midst of my stride, I thought I’d be able to walk far beyond Westminster, through the East End and out into Essex, perhaps even as far as Braddon, where I could shelter, alone in the large house, leaving my problems in London behind me. But in truth, I barely got much beyond my own postcode before I looped back round onto The Mall. I wandered in the direction of home, past Victoria, taking a brief detour onto Eccleston Square to pass my first adult home, fresh out of university. It felt like a lifetime ago now, like I was passing the former home of another person I vaguely knew, rather than myself.

With every step, one word circled my brain, pecking at me like a hostile bird: truth. Why was I so obsessed with it? Why did it matter so much? Why couldn’t I let sleeping dogs lie? Matthew’s deception had surely been to protect both me and Titus from a truth neither