goody two-shoes, don’t you? But I’m telling you now, Vic,’ he added, in the same incongruously mild tone of voice. ‘None of them, none of them, can be trusted, you hear me?’
A different prison guard stopped by their table, making Vicky start. ‘We’re not having any problems here, are we?’ he said softly. ‘Only, you are looking a little bit agitated, Mr Allen, and we can stop a visit if it proves to aggravate a man.’ He turned to look at Vicky. ‘Hmm?’
She smiled at the officer. ‘Everything’s fine here, thank you,’ she said politely. ‘So,’ she added, turning back to Paddy, ‘shall I get us some cake?’
The taxis were lined up and waiting when Vicky emerged. Plenty for everyone who wanted one. A bumper profit day. And she was lucky to get a bus almost immediately once back in Leeds, for the hour or so’s trip back to Bradford Interchange.
It had got better. A little better. He had calmed himself down. They’d eaten cake – something with poppy seeds that lodged in her teeth – about which they’d laughed, and which he’d tenderly got rid of. She’d hang on to that. The words he’d mouthed as he’d touched his nail to her tooth. The way he’d slipped it along her gum, mouthing things that made her blush. The way he’d told her how he physically ached for her.
Yes, she’d hang on to that. Not the stuff about her not going out. Not the stuff about how there were people on the inside who knew all about what happened on the outside. Not the stuff about how it would be best if she didn’t hang around with Lucy – with any of them – not till he was out and he could look after her properly.
‘I can look after myself,’ she’d told him, chin up, defiant.
‘You think you can, babe,’ he’d said, ‘but, trust me, you can’t.’
No, she’d definitely stop trying to figure out what he’d meant. Just hang on to those last words. That he physically ached for her. And loved her. He’d been sure to tell her that.
And as they’d hugged, it had occurred to her that his protective streak was a good thing. He would surely feel the same about his baby.
‘So you haven’t told him anything?’
Vicky’s tone was incredulous. Lucy shook her head, feeling irritable and tearful all of a sudden. And all of a sudden wishing she had stuck to her guns and told Vic she’d prefer to get her results alone. It would be almost comical if it wasn’t so awful. Sitting here, in the waiting area of the packed gynae clinic only a week after sitting in the ante-natal one with her friend. Just a corridor and a whole world away.
‘No, of course not,’ she said now, feeling guilty for sounding snappy. ‘There’s nothing to tell him yet, is there?’
‘No, but … you know. About your periods and that …’
‘No, Vic. I haven’t.’
‘Alright, mate,’ Vicky said, putting an arm around her shoulder. Which act of tenderness – almost maternal tenderness – just made it worse.
Lucy had never been one for horoscopes or fate or other such spiritual nonsense. There was a girl at the solicitors – an articled clerk, so no doubt pretty clever – who read her stars in the paper daily, and, since she’d begun there, Lucy’s too. And Lucy (wondering how someone who had letters after her name could take any notice of such nonsense) would smile politely and agree that it would be nice to ‘come into some money’, or ‘see a welcome shift in a special relationship’, or whatever other guff was in the paper that day. And yet this morning – she’d taken the afternoon off for her appointment – astrology had warned her to be ‘braced for bad news’.
‘Though your natural Sagittarian optimism will help you overcome any obstacles,’ Marie had continued brightly, before dumping the paper and returning to her work.
Lucy had picked it up and re-read it, trying to see it for the rubbish it was. And yet, was it?
It had been such a strange and disconcerting few weeks. Vicky pregnant. Vicky pregnant. Vicky going to have a baby. As her mam had commented when she’d told her the astonishing news, it seemed only yesterday that the pair of them were babies themselves. ‘Running round the garden in your pants and vests,’ her mam had finished. She’d sighed then. ‘Where did all those years go?’
And it did feel exactly like that, despite everything. Despite the fact that they’d both been with their boyfriends for ages. Despite the fact that they’d both been having sex. God, was it really so astonishing that Vic should fall pregnant? That was the way nature had designed humans, wasn’t it? To have sex and make babies while they were young and fit and fertile. Well, at least in Vicky’s case, anyway.
‘I’m so jealous,’ Vic had wailed to her when she explained about the GP having put her on the pill.
‘You know, Vic,’ Lucy had said, feeling chippy about it all. ‘There’s nothing stopping you from going to the family planning clinic, you know.’
‘Er, how about my mam?’
‘Vic, you’re sixteen. She doesn’t even need to know.’
‘Yeah, but you think I’d manage to keep it from her? Not a chance, mate. She’s like bloody Sherlock!’
Which struck Lucy as a bit of a ridiculous thing for Vicky to say, since her mam could barely rouse herself enough to get off the sofa, much less start ferreting around in her daughter’s sex life. No, the truth was much simpler: she just hadn’t got around to it. That and the business of being brought up Catholic. And the ‘fact’ – if fact it was, and Lucy’s doctor had said it wasn’t anything like a given – that if you went on the pill you immediately put a stone on, and might get a thrombosis as well.
But it was that stone – that was the main thing. Lucy knew how Paddy’s mind worked. He monitored Vicky’s size like it was a project he was micro-managing. If she put on so much as an ounce he’d be on at her that she was letting herself go.
Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.
Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».
Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.
Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.
