two silhouetted legs going to the ground.
“Who’s there?” Connie said, in as commanding a voice as she could muster.
It wouldn’t be Henry, would it? Playing a joke? No, he wouldn’t smoke a cigarette, even for a lark. No reply came from the chair, although Connie could sense that the occupant had heard her and was now motionless, on edge and waiting.
“It’s not funny,” Connie said, looking for some weapon. But Henry was such a stickler for putting the few garden tools they owned into the shed that there was nothing to hand. She spotted a small earthenware flowerpot and picked it up. Anything would do.
No head was visible, which meant the occupant was either slouched down in the seat or was very short. Her heart was pounding as she neared the side of the chair.
“You’ve had your fun.” Her mouth was dry and it was hard to swallow.
She reached the edge of the chair. Finally she could see the occupant. A big man, slouched down. The angular good looks of his face, his slicked hair, the cheap, dark suit. Eyes glinting in the night air. This wasn’t right. It couldn’t be right. Jesus, no …
And yet, Vince Halliday was sitting, as bold as brass, in her garden smoking a cigarette.
“Looks like you’ve had your fun too,” Vince said, fixing her with his deep-blue eyes. “Nice set-up, Con. Vicar’s wife, eh? Who’d have thought? I laughed when I saw that.”
At first she couldn’t believe it. How was this possible? How had he found her? She couldn’t even really hear his words as her head swam with a seasick-like queasiness, half-hoping that this was some hallucination caused by too much sun in the fields.
“So what’s the angle with you being a vicar’s wife?”
“No angle,” she stammered. Connie steadied herself. She felt as if she wanted to throw up. This situation was so wrong. A sickening juxtaposition of two things that shouldn’t ever meet. This grubby bull wasn’t part of her world of jam-making, tea-drinking and church fund-raising. Wearing her apron, Connie suddenly felt like a fraud, a silly girl playing at being a vicar’s wife. It added to her own deepest fears that this was all some silly role-play. Who was she kidding thinking she could be a genteel lady? Who was she kidding thinking that she could escape?
As her mind focused and she snapped back to the moment, she knew one thing. She didn’t want this. She didn’t even want to ask what he wanted here, what he was doing. She just wanted him to go so she could pretend he’d never been here. Pretend he’d never soured the milk of her supposedly perfect life. But she found herself asking nonetheless.
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