Freeing Grace Read Online Free Page B

Russell. Sala. Means Princess. She was neat.’
    She slapped my wrist. ‘Idiot! I was serious.’
    I was, too. But I laughed it off. Always do.
    ‘Look,’ I told her, ‘it feels like a reprieve. My neck was on the block. The drums were rolling and a messenger came galloping up, waving the king’s pardon.’
    She was gazing at me shrewdly. ‘I don’t believe you for one minute.’
    ‘No. Well.’ I sighed. ‘Anna wants kids.’
    ‘That’s pretty normal. Doesn’t make her a psychopath.’
    ‘Bloody hell, Luce, I’m too young to be a father. I’m not ready .’
    She snorted. ‘Jake, you’re forty! You’re wearing it well, I’ll admit that. You’re revoltingly fit, and you’ve a luscious mouth and wicked brown eyes that make women want to mother you, poor tarts. And there’s that lazy antipodean accent.’ She smiled, stretched across and tugged at my hair. ‘But one day soon you’ll find a steely strand in here, glinting treacherously.’ She leaned a little closer, focusing intently on my forehead. ‘Actually, do you dye your hair?’
    ‘Certainly not.’
    ‘What do they call that shade? Mahogany?’
    I didn’t like the way this was going. ‘Well, anyway. I do feel reprieved. And I intend to make good use of it because, as my mother always says, life isn’t a dress rehearsal.’
    ‘Really? Does your mother treat her life as the final performance?’
    I picked up the bottle and waved it at her, but she stretched a hand over her glass.
    ‘Well.’ I poured myself another. ‘She made the mistake of marrying my father, and she might as well have thrown in her lot with the devil himself. Every day’s been the same for the last forty-five years. She gets up at five. Then she bakes and cleans and sews and feeds the calves and does the garden and the washing and the accounts, while he roars around on a quad bike with a pack of dogs sprinting ahead and a dead sheep slung across the back with its tongue hanging out. Every so often he stomps into the kitchen, swears, scoffs all the food, and messes everything up again.’
    I paused, tasting the hatred. Knocked back half the glass, but it didn’t take the taste away. Never would.
    ‘They’re reckoned to be a real success story in the district. People say, “That Connie Kelly, she doesn’t waste a minute of her life.” ’ I shuddered. ‘And they’re right. She hasn’t wasted a minute. She’s wasted the whole bloody lot.’
    ‘How far are they from a town?’ asked Lucy.
    ‘They’re in the middle of nowhere, Luce. And I mean that absolutely literally. It’s an hour sliding down a gravel track to a tar-sealed road, and you’re still another hour from the nearest traffic light.’
    ‘You’re joking.’
    ‘Wish I was.’
    ‘Why haven’t they been over here? You could pay.’
    ‘Dad won’t come, and I wouldn’t see him if he did.’
    ‘Why not?’
    I scowled, and Lucy raised her eyebrows.
    ‘Well, it all sounds very childish.’ She poured herself some fizzy water. ‘Still, I suppose now that you’re single and unemployed you’ll be heading home.’
    ‘I can’t. My place has long-term tenants.’
    ‘Not home to Clapham Common, you idiot. Home to New Zealand.’
    I shook my head madly, holding up both hands. ‘Oh, no, no, no. No way!’
    ‘I don’t believe you. I’ve seen you sniffling away when the All Blacks do the haka.’
    ‘Bollocks.’ I took a bite of steak sandwich.
    ‘It’s not bollocks. You go all misty-eyed when Kiri Te Kanawa comes on the radio, too. I think it’s time you went home, Jake. You need to. Make peace with yourself, and with your family, and buy a vineyard or something. I might even visit you.’
    ‘Never. I couldn’t live without the Northern Line at rush hour.’ I paused, pointing at my cheek. The steak was a bit chewy. ‘Mind you, I’m the only one left. When I first arrived there were sixteen of us flatting in three rooms.’
    ‘How revolting.’
    ‘They all went home in the end. All except