Page 24 of All Summer Long

‘It’s not my fault if you don’t know where your own wife is, city slicker,’ Robinson said, needling him deliberately because it felt good.

‘Where she is or who she’s shagging, by the looks of it,’ Brad said, twin spots of colour sparking up on his cheekbones.

Alice stepped forward and stood beside Robinson. ‘What do you want, Brad?’

‘To talk with my wife in private, if that’s not too much to ask around here these days.’

‘It is,’ Robinson said. ‘This is my house for the next six months. Make an appointment through my lawyer if you want to come in.’

Alice laid a hand on Robinson’s arm. ‘It’s okay, I’ll talk to him.’

Robinson looked down at her, knowing he was interfering where he had no place. And then, even though again he knew he had no place, he dipped his head and kissed Alice brief and hard on the mouth. He caught her unaware, so much so that her mouth opened a little in surprise. His tongue brushed over hers momentarily, sending a shiver down his spine, and her eyes widened a little when he broke off and stepped back.

‘I’ll be in the kitchen if you need me,’ he said, touching her cheek, and then stalked out and left them to it.

Alice took Brad through to the lounge, where he pushed the door closed and spun around to face her.

‘What the fuck do you think you’re doing?’

‘I’m sorry?’

Brad jerked his head towards the door. ‘Him. Who even is he?’

Alice sighed. ‘He’s the new tenant. I told you about him, or at least I let your solicitor know that the lease had been agreed.’

‘New tenant and a whole lot more besides, by the looks of it,’ Brad levelled at her. ‘You didn’t waste any time letting someone else stick their tongue down your throat.’

She stared at him for a few long moments. ‘I’ll remind you, as it seems that you’ve forgotten, that you left me for another woman. What did you expect me to do, Brad, sit around and pine for you? Is that the problem here? You don’t want me but you don’t want me to have anyone else either?’

‘You’re still my wife,’ he said.

‘Yes, and I was your wife when you decided to sleep with Felicity Shaw. It didn’t seem to stop you then.’

He ran his hands through his hair. ‘I don’t fucking believe this,’ he muttered, and Alice could see that he genuinely didn’t. Self-belief had always been one of Brad’s strongest traits; it must be a difficult pill for him to swallow that anyone could move on from him. Was that what she’d done? If he’d turned up even so much as yesterday then the answer would have been no, but that was then and this was now, the day after she’d made out with Robinson Duff at the kitchen table. So yeah, maybe she had moved on just a little bit and she was selfishly glad that it seemed to hurt Brad on some level, even if it was his pride rather than his heart.

‘Why are you here?’ she asked him quietly.

‘You know, I even felt bad about coming here today to say this, but not any fucking more,’ he said, posturing by the fireplace. ‘This is my house and I want it back. I want Borne Manor.’

CHAPTER TEN

‘Why did you do that?’

Alice stormed into the kitchen and rounded on Robinson ten minutes later. Brad had pushed every last one of her buttons and she was just about ready to explode.

He leaned on the Aga in her favourite spot and folded his arms over his chest, unrepentant.

‘He deserved it.’

‘And that was your decision to make, was it? Did you stop for even one minute to think about what I wanted? Don’t bother answering that, I’ll do it for you. No, Robinson. No, you damn well didn’t.’

Robinson shrugged. ‘If you want me to apologise, I’m not going to, Alice, he needed a dose of his own medicine. He’s only lucky I didn’t hit him.’

They faced each other across the kitchen.

‘You know what this is, don’t you? This is you taking your marriage problems out on mine. There’s a man out there somewhere in the world that you wish you’d punched, and your crazy, screwed-up logic somehow thinks that taking it out on Brad is going to even up the score. Well it might make you feel manly in your own eyes, but it makes you look a twat in mine.’

A pulse flickered along his jaw and his eyes flared with anger. She didn’t care. He wasn’t half as pissed off as she was right now. She yanked the back door open so hard it banged back on its hinges and then turned back to him, furious.

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