Page 53 of Perfect Wives
Sorry, everyone! Ryan has found this all really stressful.
Dan has left the group
TWENTY-EIGHT
GEORGIE
‘Do nothing.’ I shake my head as I cross the school playground the next morning, Oscar’s lost coat slung over my arm – found exactly where he said it wasn’t, on the classroom coat hooks.
‘Do nothing,’ I mutter again, like I have every hour since Keira’s ultimatum yesterday.
It’s not like I wanted to drive to the country lanes of Fordly Woods last night and kill her ex. But ignoring her isn’t going to make it go away. I did nothing when Jonny first showed me that photo at the street party. I told no one I knew him. A mistake. And this feels like another one.
I couldn’t sleep last night. I lay awake wondering if Keira was doing the same. If she was waiting for her phone to ring or someone to knock on her door and tell her the news her soon-to-be ex-husband was dead.
She must know by now we haven’t done it. The thought causes a jittery energy to pulse through my body. I’m scared and wired and uncertain. What will she do next? Send the recording to our husbands? Send it to the police? All I know for sure is that she won’t do nothing. Keira didn’t go to the trouble of murdering someone to stop now.
I sidestep a group of reception mums clustered around a pushchair, cooing over a newborn, and I’m halfway back towards the gates where Tasha and Beth are standing, when I spot her. Keira.
She’s impossible to miss in cherry-red activewear. The Lycra set hugs her body, full hips, a soft stomach, breasts that look barely contained. She looks like a woman who owns her strengths and is happy to use them. And Nate – my Nate – is talking to her again.
My mouth turns dry. Is she telling him?
I stop walking and watch his eyes roam discreetly over Keira’s body. And despite my fears, something clenches in my stomach. My body is strong, lean. I train seven days a week. I use the best creams, oils and scrubs. My skin is polished. My stomach is flat and defined. But my husband doesn’t look at me that way anymore. Doesn’t look at me at all most days.
I draw in a deep breath and try to chase the thought away with one of my mantras, but nothing comes. Nate and I used to be good at the surface stuff – the chatter, the easy smiles, the teasing and jokes. Even if there was nothing beyond the surface, at least we had that. At least we could pretend we were OK. Now he watches me when he thinks I’m not looking. I catch the look in his eyes I remember from all those years ago during the investigation into my boss, Reggie. Like he’s trying to solve a puzzle. Trying to see how the pieces fit.
Nate told the police he was messaging with Jonny hours before his death. Could Jonny have shown him the photo of us?
The image is innocent enough. A group of people sat side by side in a leather booth in a bar. My boss Reggie on one side of me. Jonny on the other. All of us grinning at the camera. Jonny always was a cocky piece of shit. He was a good friend of Reggie’s and would join us on some of our nights out, celebrating a good deal or a good quarter. The kinds of nights when my champagneglass never emptied and the music was good, the mood better. A night celebrating our success.
It was about a month after that damning photo was taken when Nate began his investigation into Reggie. He asked me about the nights out, and I lied and told him I wasn’t invited. A white lie to cover the bigger lie. The truth Nate would never forgive about my past – I wasn’t just Reggie’s personal assistant; I was helping him with inside trading. I used to photocopy deal sheets I wasn’t supposed to see. Forward calendar invites to his burner phone under the guise of booking travel. I overheard things – upcoming mergers, earnings reports, quiet restructures – and passed them on. It didn’t feel like we were hurting anyone. It felt like I was being smart, taking my cut, being a team player. But it all came crashing down when Nate began investigating Reggie’s team. I convinced him I was innocent, sharing details of Reggie and his junior, pretending I didn’t understand what I was giving him.
I had no idea Jonny knew the truth about the insider trading and my part in it. I barely remembered him until he moved into Magnolia Close and showed me the photo. It isn’t my smiling younger self that’s the problem in that photo. It’s what it means that I was there.
Nate’s job is to investigate and stop any wrongdoing by the bank’s employees. If he ever learns that not only did I get away with my part in the crimes we committed but that he married the woman he should’ve fired, should’ve had charged, he’ll be furious. His moral compass will never allow him to forgive me. If he finds out the truth about who I was before we met, there will be no fixing us.
The wail of the newborn yanks me back to the school playground. A little girl barrels into me before darting off after a friend. I stumble and catch myself, realising I’ve been standing still. Staring. I glance at Tasha and Beth. They’re watchingme watch Keira and Nate. I see the same fears pinching their expressions, wondering what she’s telling him.
When I glance back towards Nate and Keira, their body language has changed. Keira’s arms are folded across her chest, her gaze fierce. Nate is no longer smiling, his expression stony. Keira leans close, and whatever she’s saying, she’s talking in a fast whisper.
Cold fear floods my chest. Blood thuds in my ears. I fight the urge to turn and run, and instead start towards them. Keira catches the movement, and her face breaks into a wide smile that seems forced. She’s wearing bright-red lipstick again. The colour of trouble. Of danger.
‘There you are,’ Nate says as I approach. His voice is a little too bright as he leans forward, dropping a kiss on my cheek. It’s a fight to keep the surprise from my face. When was the last time Nate kissed me in public? Or at home for that matter?
‘Everything OK?’ I ask, matching Keira’s smile. Nate isn’t the only one who can fake it.
‘Absolutely,’ he says. ‘Keira was just telling me about a birthday party for her daughter next month.’
‘Rowan,’ Keira supplies, like she’s reminding him. She doesn’t look at me when she says it.
Nate checks his phone, hissing an expletive under his breath. ‘I forgot I’ve got a meeting in five minutes. I’ll see you at home.’ He kisses me again and strides away, leaving me with Keira – a murderer. She killed the one man who could destroy my entire life, only to replace him. The woman whose ex she expected us to kill last night, and we didn’t.
‘What do you think you’re doing?’ I hiss before I can think better of it.
Keira’s smirk is quizzical. ‘Talking to your husband?’ she replies.
‘About what?’ I ask.
