Erin Knight - Perfect Strangers - an unputdownable read full of gripping secrets and twists

‘Nothing really. Ordered a few pots of tea, a really good flapjack and just . . . thought about everything. About what I’m aiming for. One step at a time, like Jenny said.’

Name-dropping her therapist was a poorly veiled attempt to pretend any of this was a good idea. Jenny didn’t matter, only Sophie mattered. Sophie being on board was integral. This was all about them, Isobel and Sophie, sisters with their secrets.

‘And have they changed any? Those things you’re aiming for?’

Isobel let a strand of text run through her mind like the credits of a disturbing film. Clear as reading it onscreen again, his words crisp and sharp and penetrative.

Filthy little bitch. Dirty, filthy little bitch. Didn’t think of the consequences did you, bitch?

Consequences. Now there was a word. Isobel swallowed. ‘You think I’m on a wild goose chase, don’t you?’

Sophie hesitated. ‘No. I think you’re on a journey, Isobel. I’m just not sure it’ll lead you anywhere you really want to go.’

6

‘Then she says, “ I have a right to use my breasts! My daughter has a right to be fed! ”’

Cleo stopped for air. It was exhausting sounding like Lorna. Sarah seized her chance to speak. ‘This is the same Lorna we’re talking about here, isn’t it? Pretty head scarves, porcelain skin? Lovely but hyper son in Max’s class?’

Cleo nodded into the phone, resuming her Lorna impersonation full-fury. ‘ “ First I’m harassed by that battleaxe ” – that was when Lorna turned her baguette on me, Sarah – “ and now YOU are discriminating against me too! Against my baby! You, Cleo Roberts . . . a mother! ”’

Lorna had launched into an impressive tirade about ‘women like Cleo’, busy types too self-centred to fully appreciate the nutritional needs of their own babies, cheeky mare! But it had been hard enough for Cleo to hear all that guff; she wasn’t about to inflict it on Sarah too. Sarah’s battle with the boob had been worse than Cleo’s after Patrick ditched Sarah and the boys. She’d tormented herself over the whole horrendous thing, of course. Poor girl.

‘Do you know what she said then, Sar? “ You’re supposed to support other women, not knock us down when we’re vulnerable!’ ’ ’

Sarah was about to play devil’s advocate, Cleo could smell it. Sarah always so annoyingly fair-handed, Cleo a raving madwoman by comparison.

‘Maybe she was feeling just a bit vulnerable? Gosh, I remember what I was like after Max was born. I don’t think I stopped crying for the first six months. I was a snotty, tired, milky mess. Poor Will. Stuck with a mum like that.’

‘Vulnerable? Lorna? Ha! I could see the whites of her eyes, Sarah. I braced myself for a sandwich-related injury. I’d have been splashed all over that hideous Fallenbay Dartboard page . . . BAGUETTE RAGE! Local businesswoman floored by fake brie! And anyway, your situation was unique. You had every reason to cry for six months, and more. Awful man.’

‘I think it’s Fallenbay Pinboard.’

‘I know. But it’s more like a dartboard. Who even takes part in those awful anonymous Facebook pages? Complaining about the street lighting, ripping the high school to shreds, negative, negative, negative. People are hideous. No wonder kids misbehave online, the parents are just as antisocial.’ Sam wandered into the kitchen, silently prodding at the leftovers. Max began yelling in Sarah’s background, something about a bloody finger. ‘The brie’s not fake, by the way.’

‘I have to go, Cle. Max’s trying to pull another tooth out, the tyrant. Sebastian Brightman has told him baby teeth are for babies. Seb only wants to be friends with boys who are growing their big teeth.’

‘Sounds like something Olivia Brightman’s offspring would say. Anyway, ew. I hate blood. Makes my buttocks go funny. I’ll leave you to it. Catch you in the week. Oh! And tell the school crazies not to boycott me, would you?’

‘Like they’d listen to me, Cle. A lowly teacher. See you.’

Cleo put the phone down. Sam was still foraging. Leave him long enough and the dishes wouldn’t need scraping at all. This was how their paths crossed now, Cleo at some mundane task, Sam quietly rooting nearby. They were like a night-vision segment on Countryfile . Two nocturnal creatures fumbling around the same hidden camera, occupying the same insignificant part of the ecosystem independently of one another. Except when they were fighting. Or feeding.

Sam popped something into his mouth and flicked on the kitchen TV. ‘Good quiche, Cle.’ She caught herself observing him like a farm vet again, looking for evidence of the middle-aged spread certain to sneak up on him while he wasn’t looking and cut short his life like his poor father’s. Builders had terrible diets. It was all bacon baps and flasks of syrupy tea. Ploughmen . . . apparently they knew how to eat.

Sam burst briefly to life. ‘That clipped the wicket!’

‘The microwave blew up today,’ Cleo said idly. I did tell you .

Sam made a non-committal noise and propped himself over the back of one of the dining chairs, reverently checking the scores he’d missed. His neck was sunburnt. Was he working outside again now? He’d been tiling en-suites the last time they’d spoken about his job. Sam had been working on the Compass Point development site, the latest target of the Hornbeam school mothers and their petitions. Juliette had soon rallied the troops when she realised her super-home would have to share the coastline.

Cleo began aggressively scraping plates. ‘I’ve been told to expect a boycott by the school mothers.’ Juliette’s PFA members hunted together in a well-orchestrated pack. You’ll be sorry, Cleo! Lorna had warned. Cleo already felt a bit sorry and she hadn’t actually done anything wrong. ‘All thanks to a silly misunderstanding about a breast.’ Sam wasn’t listening. ‘About a nipple, Sam . . . a great big nipple.’

‘Humph?’ he grunted, eyes fixed on the TV.

‘Lorna was sitting in the café window with both bangers out, Sam.’

Finally, a flicker of interest. ‘Fair play!’

Cleo smiled. Bangers was Sam’s favourite boob word. Quite possibly because it doubled up for sausages , another of his favourite things.

Sam yelled at the TV.‘Fair play, my man, fair play! One hundred-and-eight not out.’

Cleo scowled. Heathen . She wrung out the dishcloth and imagined Jonathan pouring Sarah a lovely glass of wine, listening attentively while she reflected on their day together at the marine dinosaur thingy.

‘There’ll be no end of nipples on the loose if we start hosting private functions like they do at the French place in town. Parties always get a bit rowdy; a bit of drunken debauchery might be just what the till needs.’

‘We?’ Sam laughed. ‘Coast is your party, Cleo. Always has been. I would be up for a bit of debauchery though, love. Shout up anytime.’

She ignored him. ‘Coast would be our party if you got involved. Convert the stores for me. Customers could watch the sunset over the ocean if we knocked through.’

‘I offered to help out at weekends, Cleo. You weren’t interested.’

‘Yes, but that was behind the counter. You’re a builder, Sam! Come builder this extension so we can expand . . .’

‘I’m not talking shop now,’ Sam said firmly. ‘I’ve been at it all day.’

Cleo scowled at the array of kitchen appliances awaiting her next move. ‘Evie Roberts, get down here and load this dishwasher or I’m confiscating that bloody iPhone!’

Sam jumped. ‘Bit louder, eh, Cleo?’ He ran dry, cracked hands back and forth through his hair. A cloud of plaster dust rose into the air above him. Cleo had fallen in love with that hair once. Kevin Costner hair. Before Sam’s had started to thin and hers started sprouting in new places.