‘We have to go now,’ Karin said.

‘Be a pet and make me a cup of tea first,’ Joan said.

She lowered the volume on the remote when Karin was in the kitchen and turned to Jake. ‘How long have you been seeing each other?’ she asked.

‘Three months,’ he replied.

‘You and Nadine…I have to assume your marriage is over?’

‘Yes.’

‘I’m sorry.’ Her eyelids sagged heavily over her eyes but she had the same disconcerting stare as her daughter. ‘How is Nadine?’

‘She‘s fine. We’ve had an amicable separation.’

‘You’re one of the lucky ones then. An amicable separation is not an easy thing to achieve.’

Did he imagine a dart of pity in her expression before she turned back to the screen?

‘We are where we are.’ The politician being interviewed on the evening news had the haunted look of a man clinging to a cliché. ‘Burning the bond holders is not in our best interests.’

Jake disagreed. He wanted a pyre. He wanted to strike the match, smell roasting flesh, hear the sizzle of gristle, the splatter of muscle. He wanted a walk of shame, bankers, politicians, developers, speculators, all in handcuffs, in the stocks, being pelted with eggs and rotten fruit. But all he heard was empty rhetoric. We are where we are. How blindingly obvious was that?

Chapter 22

Nadine

Plus Beauty Expo is, as its name suggests, all about beauty. From lip gloss to collagen, contour creams to liposuction, face masks to face lifts, we can have it all as we battle with free radicals and the unrelenting grind of time. I’d hoped to meet Ali while I’m in London but she’s in Manchester for the weekend at a Stanislavski workshop. At least I’ll have a chance to see Stuart. The last time we met he was about to undergo his chemo and I feel guilty that I haven’t been back since. He sounded strong and positive when I rang to tell him I’d be in London. He’s making an excellent recovery and has finished all his treatments.

Jessica and Liam work with me on the Lustrous stand. I distribute free copies of the magazine and speak to potential customers about the advantages of advertising with us. By the end of two days walking the long halls and talking about Lustrous it’s a relief to take a taxi to Canary Wharf where Stuart is waiting for me. I glide smoothly upwards in a tower of glass and steel to the seventh floor.

Stuart holds my hands in a hard clasp of welcome. I’m conscious of their structure, of sharp bones beneath the flesh. He’s always carried weight, solid flesh not flab, but he’s thinner now and it suits him. He’s my godfather, my only link with my mother and I always feel a startling jolt of recognition when I see his angular cheekbones, the gap between his two front teeth, his warm, welcoming smile.

‘Tell me about everything.’ He opens a bottle of wine and pours a glass, hands it to me. A pot of lamb ragú simmers on the cooker. ‘I’m still trying to get used to the idea of you and Jake separating. Of all the couples I know who are on the verge of divorce and, believe me, I know many, you two are the last couple I expected to break up. I always thought you were joined at the hip.’

‘At least we’re young enough not to need hip replacements,’ I joke and he smiles warily.

‘How are you managing under the circumstances?’ he asks. ‘Is it difficult living under the same roof with Jake? A clean break would be that much easier.’

I agree it’s not an ideal solution. I don’t want to think about the nights I wait for Jake to come home or the envy I feel but must control because that was never part of the deal we made.

‘What about you?’ I steer the conversation towards Stuart. His hair has thinned and turned completely grey since we last met. His face, I realise, is thin, not lean, and the skin under his neck sags, as if unable to cope with a sudden weight loss. ‘Have you finished all your treatment?’

‘All done and dusted,’ he says. ‘I’m heading to Alaska in August.’

He specialises in industrial photography and I assume this is another commission, an oil refinery, perhaps, or a coal mine.

‘Not this time,’ he says. ‘I’ve retired. This is all about ice.’

Photographing ice is Stuart’s hobby. Icicles hanging from eaves, ice cubes clinking in a glass, glaciers, icebergs, frozen cobwebs suspended between the stems of flowers. Ice has brought him to the summit of mountains, the Arctic Circle and up close to garden hedges. Now, he’s chartered a boat for August and intends to sail along the Southeast coast of Alaska.

‘How long will you be away?’ I ask.

‘I haven’t booked my return flight. It all depends…’

‘On what?’

He swerves away from the question and finds a map, spreads it over the table. He runs his finger along the Alaskan coast line, touching Juneau, Skagway, Sitka, Glacier Bay. He names inlets, coves, islands, bays, straits.

‘The owner of the boat will come with me,’ he says. ‘Daveth Carew has been conducting tours since he was a teenager. He knows the coast like the back of his hand.’

When the sailing is done Stuart will move inland to photograph the Juneau icefield. He needs someone to look after him. He never married. No woman would put up with his erratic lifestyle, he said when I asked him once. Always on the go, travelling here, there and everywhere. I think of Max Moylan. The same nomadic lifestyle and the toll it took on his marriage. But Max needed women, unlike Stuart who always found contentment in his own company.

‘Would you consider coming with me?’ he asks.

‘Me?’ For an instant I think he’s joking but his expression tells me otherwise.

He laughs at my astonishment then stops abruptly, as if the sound has become unfamiliar. ‘Don’t look so astonished. I’m said I’m going to Alaska, not Mars. You’ve as much as admitted that you and Jake are living in an impossible situation.’

‘But I know nothing about boats. I’d be a hindrance more than anything else on a trip like that.’

‘I wouldn’t ask you if that’s what I thought,’ he replies. ‘This is a chance to do something different. Don’t give me your answer until you’ve had time to seriously consider my proposal.’

‘You could easily get someone with more experience.’

‘I could,’ he admits. ‘But you’re the closest I’ve ever come to having a child of my own.’ For the first time I hear emotion in his voice, a quiver he’s unable to disguise. ‘Life is short, Nadine, and we allow so much of it to slip through our fingers. It would give us time to get to know each other a little better.’

I walk to the window and look down upon the city. Rooftops shimmer in the stillness of high places. It’s still bright outside and sun is a translucent disc, barely visible in the hazed London air. He’s offered me an escape route, but is sailing in treacherous seas with two men, one a stranger, the answer to my problems? Of course not… but what have I to lose? A domineering mother-in-law whose unbending attitude is never going to soften, a scattered family, a job that bores me and Jake… with his inscrutable gaze and secrets. The silence of vast empty spaces instead of the constant thud of music from his apartment when he’s there. The pressure of unasked questions when he’s not.

Stuart is knowledgeable and confident but there is a manic edge to his enthusiasm that worries me. Is he oblivious of the fact that gale force winds can whip without warning and change everything? The urge to ring Jake and discuss this preposterous proposal with him comes and goes. I’ll make up my own mind. By the time the elevator stops at ground level I know the answer. Madness. No way will I even consider it.

Chapter 23

Jake

Eleanor opened the front door to Apartment 2 with her own key. It annoyed Jake that she could enter his apartment without knocking but he could hardly object when Sea Aster was her property. He swivelled his shoulders to loosen them and laid his guitar aside. He had been so engrossed in his music that the morning had slipped by unnoticed and Eleanor’s visit had been forgotten.