The Lying Game (32 page)

He’d fight for Nell. But not for her.

‘Fine,’ she snapped, turning to scan the street for taxis. ‘If that’s what you want.’

He grabbed her arm, jerking her round to face him. ‘Of course it’s not what I
want
!’ he cried. ‘What I want to do is get in that cab with you, take the kids
home, and know I still have a marriage and a life to get up for! You think I wanted
any
of this? Zoey’s dead, Nell doesn’t want me, you don’t want me – what am I
supposed to do? Throw myself into my work? Live for alternate weekends when I can see the kids in a McDonald’s halfway between my place and yours? Jesus, Harriet! You’ve broken my
fucking heart!’

Her chest tightened painfully. ‘What makes you think I don’t want you?’

A taxi glided to the kerb beside them. ‘Just a minute,’ Oliver said to the cabbie.

‘What makes you think I don’t want you?’ Harriet repeated.

His expression was suddenly wary. ‘I think you’ve made that pretty damn clear.’

‘I’m angry, Oliver! You had an
affair
!’

‘And how do you know you
didn’t
?’

‘
Ben
? Really, that’s your defence? Something I may or may not have done sixteen years ago, before we were even married! For God’s sake, Oliver, even if I did, I
didn’t mean to!’

He laughed hollowly. ‘Jesus, Harriet. Nor did I!’

The cabbie leaned on his horn. ‘You want to go anywhere, mate, or not?’

‘Can you just wait?’ Oliver said impatiently. ‘Start the meter. I’ll pay.’

Harriet searched his face. She couldn’t deny she loved this man, for everything he had ever been to her and everything he still could be. She understood the difference between love and
sex. She knew it was deceit and betrayal that broke a marriage, not a brief coupling between the sheets, however passionate. And hadn’t she been just as guilty of that as Oliver? Not just
because of Ben, whatever had or hadn’t happened that night, but because she had lied and gone behind his back, telling herself it was for the best of reasons. She’d broken the trust
between them just as much as he had.

Part of her had gone looking for Nell because she’d had an atavistic need to know the child she’d carried inside her for nine months was safe and happy. She’d realized that
until she did, there’d be an invisible wall between her and Florence, the lie driving an ever broader wedge between them. But if she was truly honest with herself, it had been more than that.
Oliver was right: she’d been looking to start over. To find the perfect daughter, to have another chance to be the perfect mother. Instead, she’d fallen in love with Nell, flawed as she
was, the kind of daughter she’d never imagined having. And she’d understood that the daughter she’d wanted all along had been right there at home with her.

She acknowledged as she stood there that she’d wronged Oliver just as much as he’d wronged her. He’d been in the right as much as she had. So why was she finding it so hard to
forgive him?

It wasn’t anger or hurt pride that was holding her back from giving him a second chance. It was
fear.
Fear that he’d let her down again, of course, and hurt her a second
time; but more than that, she was terrified of her own feelings. If she opened the door to him and finally allowed herself to be vulnerable, there’d be no going back.

‘I love you, Oliver,’ she said suddenly, her voice shaking. ‘You’re my best friend. I can’t picture a world without you. I can’t be happy without you. Life
without you wouldn’t be living, but surviving. And the thought of that scares me fucking shitless.’

‘Christ, Harriet,’ he said, choking, pulling her into his arms. ‘Christ. Of course. Of course it scares you fucking shitless. That’s what love
does.’

She pressed her head against the crisp white linen of his new shirt, bought especially for the funeral of his mistress, and breathed in the scent of laundered cotton and tea-tree shampoo and
coffee, and something else that was uniquely Oliver. His arms tightened around her, and she fought the overwhelming urge to simply yield. How could she risk having him break her heart again? Yet
how could she bear to give him up? How could she live without
this?

‘I don’t know,’ she whispered. ‘I don’t know if I can trust you again. I want to, Oliver. You have no idea how much I want to. I’m just not sure we can fix
this now.’

‘Can’t we at least
try?’

She pulled back, holding him at arm’s length as she searched his face for answers. His sincerity was evident, but was it enough? The road to hell was paved with good intentions. He’d
never
meant
to cheat on her with Zoey, but it’d happened. How could she be sure it wouldn’t happen again? If she forgave him, wasn’t she tacitly condoning his affair?
Having got away with it once, would he think he could do it again?

Surely he couldn’t be that stupid – or that cruel. He loved her, she knew he did. He wouldn’t risk losing her again.

He risked it before,
a voice whispered in her head.
You can’t be sure he won’t do it again.

No. There were no guarantees. She had two choices. She could play it safe, walk away from him, raise the drawbridge, drop the portcullis. Or she could take a chance on the man she loved.

She gave him his answer.

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘We can try.’

This has been a tough year for me. My father, Michael, the best and bravest man I know, was diagnosed with terminal cancer and died as I was halfway through this manuscript,
only sixty-eight. Since my beloved mother Jane died ten years ago, at fifty-nine, I now find myself an orphan. And yes, that hurts as much at forty-something as it does at any other age.

So a heartfelt thank you to my agent, Carole Blake, and my editor, Wayne Brookes, not just for being their usual brilliant selves, but for their friendship, empathy and compassion, which has
been unparalleled and so very much appreciated.

Thanks, too, to all those at Macmillan and Blake Friedmann who work so tirelessly behind the scenes to make my books a success: my sharp-eyed and meticulous copy-editor, Juliet Van Oss, and
proofreader, Lorraine Green; Louise Buckley and Ali Blackburn in editorial; Jodie Mullish in Marketing; Sophie Ransom for her work in Publicity; and the Sales team, past and present.

And to my dearest friend and fabulous-but-unofficial editor, Tere, who stayed up till three in the morning writing copious notes on the manuscript, but more importantly is the best girlfriend a
woman could have. Love you, darling.

As always, how could I not thank my wonderfully dysfunctional family for providing endless novelistic inspiration: my children, Henry, Matt and Lily, my brother Charles and his family, my WSM
Barbara and mother-in-law Sharon, Brent and my dearest WIL Jelena.

But most of all, thanks to my husband, Erik. You have been loving, supportive, patient, compassionate, patient, gentle, patient, patient, patient. You are my rock, my centre, the one I run to.
Thank you for the hugs, the love, the cups of tea, the foot rubs. I couldn’t do any of this without you. Daddy told me I could always trust you, and he was right.

T
ESS
S
TIMSON
is the author of nine novels and two non-fiction books, and writes regularly for the
Daily Mail
as well as
for several women’s magazines. Born and brought up in Sussex, she graduated from Oxford before spending a number of years as a news producer with ITN. She now lives in Vermont with her
American husband, their daughter and her two sons.

By T
ESS
S
TIMSON

The Lying Game

The Wife Who Ran Away

What’s Yours is Mine

The Nanny

The Infidelity Chain

The Adultery Club

Hard News

Soft Focus

Pole Position

Beat the Bitch:

How to Stop the Other Woman Stealing Your Man

Yours Till the End:

The Biography of a Beirut Hostage

First published 2013 by Pan Books

This electronic edition published 2013 by Pan Books
an imprint of Pan Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited
Pan Macmillan, 20 New Wharf Road, London N1 9RR
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ISBN 978-0-230-76409-5

Copyright © Tess Stimson 2013

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