“So,” he started, his gray eyes twinkling as he bit into a digestive biscuit, “tell me everything.” Mr. Cavell leaned forward in his chair eagerly. He reminded her of an old tawny owl.
Where did everything begin? she wondered.
“The thing is, Stu has a pretty serious drug habit, as you’ve already guessed. He has to use several times a day to function. About three years ago, things got bad. We were living in Bristol then. He was stealing money from me, and I knew he was stealing from his mum, but Stu is not an easy person to break away from.” What she meant was that she was a soft touch and he was a master manipulator. “When I had no money left, he broke into the café where I worked, one night after everyone had gone home, and stole the takings. That was the last straw for me, so I broke up with him. Love isn’t always enough, as it turns out. He was already on probation, so he got sent down for two months and I lost my job, which meant I lost my flat. But it gave me the excuse I needed to not be there when he got out.”
“Good gracious me.” Mr. Cavell was riveted, and she couldn’t help smiling. “But you said he only went to prison for two months?”
“That time, yes. I went to stay with my sister Simone and her wife in Greenwich for a bit while I got myself together. Only when Stu got out, he came and found me.”
“All the way from Bristol!” he exclaimed.
“We’d been to visit my sister once before, so after having no luck in Bristol, he must have guessed I’d be there. He’d already tried my eldest sister in Rowan Thorp.”
“And then what happened?” His biscuit arm was suspended halfway to his mouth, his crinkly face enraptured.
“He turned up when Simone and Evette were out for the evening. I’d say with hindsight, he’d probably waited for the right moment.”
Mr. Cavell gasped. “What did you do?”
“I told him we were over, for good, and that he had to leave. I didn’t even let him in, kept him on the doorstep. Eventually he got the message and said he would go but that he needed some cash, and could he use the toilet before he caught the coach.”
Mr. Cavell clapped his hands over his mouth, the biscuit dropped onto the plate. Clearly he had better foresight than she did.
“I only let him in for five minutes. He used the toilet while I got him some cash from my bag, and then I chucked him back out onto the street. But when Simone and Evette got back from their night out, they found that Evette’s jewelry box had been ransacked and the holiday money Simone had been saving was missing.”
Mr. Cavell shook his head sadly.
“He got caught the next day trying to pawn Evette’s grandmother’s engagement ring. He got sent down for two years, and my sister hasn’t spoken to me since.”
“But it wasn’t your fault! You were hoodwinked. That scoundrel!”
“I let him in when I should have known better. But I felt sorry for him. He’s not violent or anything, he’s just troubled and addicted and it makes him do bad things. Anyway, you know the rest because you’ve seen. He doesn’t seem to understand that we’re over. It’s like he thought we were on a hiatus while he was in prison and now that he’s out he thinks we’ll get back together.”
Stu’s tearful drunken wailing in the communal hallways, not to mention his relentless banging on her door the last two months, had resulted in numerous police calls and her current eviction.
Star had always been attracted to troubled souls, unable to resist sad puppy eyes, even when they were attached to a manipulative scoundrel. But even she had her limits.
Mr. Cavell was wringing his hands. The furrowed crease above his nose was in danger of consuming his eyebrows. “Where will you go?” he asked.
“Oh, don’t worry about me. I’ve got friends who will put me up for a while.”
She didn’t know where yet, but she’d figure it out. She always did. As she went to stand, she remembered the letter. She tore it open and smiled. Now she had a destination.
“Are you sure you have somewhere to go?” he asked, pulling nervously at his knitted sweater-vest.
“Absolutely.” She smiled at him. “You don’t need to worry about me. The universe has provided.”
By which she meant her big sister Maggie would put her up for a few days while she got her shit together and they dealt with the will. Suddenly the day had gotten a lot brighter. Mr. Cavell waved her off as she dragged her possessions up the street toward the train station. Rowan Thorp had been on her mind ever since the funeral and now she had an excuse to go back.
6
Rowan Thorp was a pretty village in the southeast of England surrounded by rolling hills, fields, forests, and other pretty villages that dotted the countryside like they’d been dropped fully formed into the landscape.
Once a bustling village with its close proximity to the river, farms, and orchards, Rowan Thorp had been a destination for traders and travelers alike. Over time it became less of a hub for merchants to sell their wares and more of an afternoon escape for city folk in need of a slower pace, some window shopping, and a cream tea.
The high street was a harmonious muddle of Georgian, Tudor, and Victorian architecture—stout, bent, tall, gabled, thatched, stone, and beam—a visual history giving voice to the ghosts of the past. Most of the houses and all of the shops were already decorated for Christmas even though it was only December third. Voluptuous wreaths of holly, ivy, and eucalyptus hung from front doors; candles stood in windows; and twinkle lights flickered from beneath frosty thatched roofs.
The Stag and Hound had erected a huge fir tree in their front courtyard, which was mirrored by the Rowan Tree Inn. Both trees were festooned in matching multicolored fairy lights of blue, red, amber, and green, hues so happy that just looking at them could warm the chilliest of cockles.
Set back a little between the two pubs, the spire of St. Swithun’s—the tip of the Holy Trinity Green triangle—punctured the forget-me-not-blue sky. The sun was impossibly bright, and the ice crystals on the paths and grass verges glittered beneath its dazzling gaze.
* * *
The offices of Steele & Brannigan Solicitors were a mixture of generic workplace carpeting and gray filing cabinets mixed in with some rather nice dark wood antique furniture. Behind her leather-topped mahogany desk, Vanessa Steele regarded the three sisters above her tented fingers.
Though she naturally saw more of Maggie these days than the other two, they had all spent their childhood summers getting into trouble and had been generally regarded by the villagers as a nightmare. She had known what to expect this morning—she had cleared her schedule in anticipation—and they didn’t disappoint. Vanessa sat quietly, waiting for the sisters to finish bickering.
“I only asked why, if you arrived last night, you didn’t come and see me?” Maggie asked. “I could have made you dinner.”
“I needed time to prepare. Mentally. You know I don’t function well in off-the-cuff situations. I don’t like having things sprung upon me and by the same token I don’t spring myself on other people,” said Simone. “Most people would appreciate that courtesy.”
“I’m not other people. I’m your sister.”