Mick once, when he came round to introduce himself. He told us something of their story – probably in a pre-emptive attempt to stop us from inviting them around for drinks. It seems that four years ago they were involved in a car crash, and lost their two young sons. His wife was badly injured and has to deal with a lot of pain and consequently suffers from depression. He didn’t give any more details, about who was driving or whose fault it was, only to say that their move to Simonsbridge was an attempt to make a fresh start. He works mostly from home – he’s an accountant – so that he can be on hand for his wife, and if he’s out visiting clients, Mrs Jeffries takes over.
Over two weeks have passed since I found the second Russian doll on the wall so it’s a bit late to ask Mick or Mrs Jeffries if they saw anything. I should still ask them to keep an eye out – whoever left the doll on my car has upped their game, wanting me to know that they followed me to Cheltenham. The fact that Ellen thought she saw Layla doesn’t trouble me; it was unfortunate that there was someone with red hair walking along the street at the time. Or fortunate, because if Ellen hadn’t run off after her, she’d have seen the doll on the car. And I need to protect her from whatever is going on.
I look at the clock; it’s coming up to twelve and I haven’t done any work since I came out to my office at nine. To take my mind off the Russian dolls, I play around with some shares for a bit. Ellen doesn’t know about this guilty pleasure of mine. I’ve never told her of the wealth I’ve accumulated over the years by playing the markets, probably because deep down I’m slightly ashamed of it. I’ve tried to stop but it’s become an addiction, just as Layla was all those years ago.
I push back from my desk, annoyed that I’m thinking of Layla again. I’m hungry, so I make my way across the garden to the house. I expect Ellen to be in her office but through the open kitchen door I see her standing at the worktop and as I watch, she picks the smallest of the Russian dolls up by its head and holds it in front of her eyes, turning it this way and that, a strange look on her face.
‘Everything OK?’ I ask, wanting to put a stop to whatever she’s doing, because it’s making me uncomfortable.
I expect her to jump guiltily as she usually does whenever I catch her with the Russian dolls. But she just nods vaguely and carries on examining it.
‘Ellen,’ I say.
‘It’s the one I lost, I’m sure of it.’ Her voice is so quiet it’s as if she’s talking to herself. I go over to her, needing to break the spell the doll seems to have cast on her.
‘What do you mean?’
‘I think Layla might be alive,’ she says, without turning round.
‘What do you mean, she might be alive?’
‘Look.’ She holds out the doll. ‘See that smudge of paint there? Mine had one exactly like it.’
‘That doesn’t prove anything,’ I say, peering at the black smudge near its base. ‘I’m sure lots of dolls have those. It’s bound to happen – paint gets smudged.’
She shakes her head stubbornly, something she’s never done before. ‘I dismissed it at first, like you. But the more I look at it, the more I think it’s the one that I lost. And I know Layla took it, even though she said she didn’t. It’s mine, I’m sure of it.’
‘Because you want it to be,’ I say gently. ‘Just like you want it to be Layla you saw in Cheltenham on Saturday. But it wasn’t. Layla isn’t alive, Ellen, not after all this time.’
She nods slowly. ‘It’s probably just as well.’
I look at her curiously. ‘Why do you say that?’
‘I’d give anything for her to be alive, of course I would.’ She pauses, searching for the words. ‘But I’m not sure she’d be happy to see us together, not when you used to be with her. It would be difficult.’ Her voice trails away.
I pull her into my arms. ‘I tried so hard not to fall in love with you,’ I say, my lips in her hair.
‘I know,’ she says softly. ‘I remember. I kept hoping that you would make the first move. But you didn’t and I realised it had to come from me.’
Her words echo down the years and I let go of her abruptly.
‘You do still want to get married, don’t you?’ she asks anxiously.
‘Of course,’ I tell her, doing my best to make my smile reach my eyes.
But first I need to find the person who’s decided to mess with my head.
Before
‘Promise you’ll never leave me again,’ I murmured, about a month after you came back. I should have made you promise out loud.
You turned your face to mine and I reached out and tucked your hair behind your ear.
‘I love you,’ I said, glad that I could finally speak the words I’d wanted to say aloud since I first saw you. ‘I truly love you, Layla Gray.’
‘I hope so,’ you teased. ‘You’ve just taken my virginity.’
I’m sure you’ll remember that day – it was the first time we’d slept together and we were lying, our bodies entwined, listening to the pattering of the rain against the window. Even after all these years, I still remember you slipping into my bed in the middle of the night, sliding your arms around me, telling me that you loved me, that you wanted me.
‘I couldn’t wait any longer,’ you murmured. ‘I kept waiting for you to come to me and then I realised that you weren’t going to, that you were waiting for me to make the first move.’
Once you were back, you became the most important thing in my life, to the exclusion of everything and everyone else. I no longer spent any meaningful time with Harry and that made things tough. He hadn’t taken to you in the way that I’d hoped he would, as he had to all the other girls that had peppered my life during the years we’d shared a flat together. Not that I think you ever noticed, because how could you believe anyone wouldn’t like you? But Harry was convinced I shouldn’t be with you, and when I began to draw away from him it put a further wedge between you both.
At weekends, when his disapproval chased us from the flat, I’d take you to museums and art exhibitions. I knew you found them boring, although you pretended otherwise. But you were never very good at lying. The problem was, London amplified the difference in our ages. Because of the nature of my job, I rarely got home before eleven. You’d found a job in that wine bar a minute’s walk from the flat, and often worked until midnight. And when you weren’t working, you wanted to go out, just as I had when I’d first arrived in London seven years before. I knew then that I needed to get us out of London. I can admit it now; I was desperate to move away before you found me boring too. I’d never felt dull, until you came along and challenged me.
It was the argument with Harry that brought things to a head. One evening, he asked if we could have a drink together, on our own, and I was immediately on edge. When he told me that he felt you were having a negative impact on me, that both
