My gaze falls on the built-in tape player.
Oh … bloody hell.
The lorry driver was amazingly nice, bearing in mind he’d just delivered sixteen coats to someone who didn’t want them and then her daughter shoved a honey sandwich inside his tape machine. It only took about half an hour to clean everything up, and we’ve promised him a state-of-the-art replacement.
As the lorry disappears out of the drive Mum and Dad head into the kitchen to make a cup of tea and Luke practically hauls me upstairs.
‘Two days?’ he demands in a whisper. ‘We’re moving out in two days?’
‘We have to, Luke! Look, I’ve got it all planned. We’ll find a rental place and we’ll tell Mum we’re moving into the house and everyone will be happy.’
Luke is regarding me as though I have a screw loose.
‘But she’ll want to visit, Becky. Hadn’t you thought of that?’
‘We won’t let her! We’ll put her off until the house has been sorted out. We’ll say we want everything to be perfect first. Luke, we don’t have any choice,’ I add defensively. ‘If we stay here any longer we’ll give her a nervous breakdown!’
Luke mutters something under his breath. It sounds a bit like, ‘You’re going to give me a bloody nervous breakdown.’
‘Well, have you got a better idea?’ I retort, and Luke is silent.
‘And what about Minnie?’ he says at length.
‘What do you mean, what about Minnie? She’ll come with us, of course!’
‘I didn’t mean that.’ He clicks his tongue. ‘I meant, what are we going to do about her? I take it you’re as concerned by what just happened as I am?’
‘By the honey sandwich?’ I say in astonishment. ‘Come on, Luke, relax. It was just one of those things, all children do it—’
‘You’re in denial! Becky, she’s getting wilder every day. I think we need to take extreme action. Don’t you agree?’
Extreme action? What’s that supposed to mean?
‘No, I don’t.’ I feel a little chilly around my spine. ‘I don’t think she needs “extreme action”, whatever that is.’
‘Well, I do.’ He’s looking grave and not quite meeting my eye. ‘I’m going to make some calls.’
What calls?
‘Luke, Minnie isn’t some kind of problem,’ I say, my voice suddenly a little shaky. ‘And who are you calling, anyway? You shouldn’t call anyone without telling me first!’
‘You’d tell me not to!’ He sounds exasperated. ‘Becky, one of us has to do something. I’m going to sound out a couple of child experts.’ He pulls out his BlackBerry and checks it, and something inside me flips.
‘What experts? What do you mean?’ I grab his BlackBerry. ‘Tell me!’
‘Give that back!’ His voice rises harshly and he pulls the BlackBerry out of my grasp.
I stare at him in shock, blood pulsing through my cheeks. He really meant that. He really didn’t want me to see. Is this about Minnie? Or … something else?
‘What’s the secret?’ I say at last. ‘Luke, what are you hiding?’
‘Nothing,’ he says defensively. ‘There’s work-in-progress on there. Rough stuff. Sensitive stuff. I don’t like anyone seeing it.’
Yeah, right. His eyes keep flicking to his BlackBerry. He’s lying. I know it.
‘Luke, you’re keeping something from me.’ I swallow hard. ‘I know you are. We’re a couple! We shouldn’t have secrets from each other!’
‘You can talk!’ He throws back his head and laughs. ‘My darling, I don’t know whether it’s shopping, or some massive debt, or you really are having Botox … but there’s something going on that you don’t want me to know about. Isn’t there?’
Shit.
‘No there is not!’ I say hotly. ‘Absolutely not!’
Please let him think it’s shopping, please let him think it’s shopping …
There’s an odd, tingly pause, then Luke shrugs.
‘Fine. Well then … neither of us is hiding anything.’
‘Fine.’ I lift my chin. ‘Agreed.’
THIRTEEN
As soon as I get up the next morning I call Bonnie’s line and leave an urgent message for her to call back. She’ll tell me what’s going on. Downstairs at breakfast there’s a prickly atmosphere, and Luke keeps glancing warily at me as though he’s not sure how to proceed.
‘So!’ he suddenly says in fake, cheerful tones. ‘Big day today. I’m trying to arrange a meeting with Sir Bernard Cross’s right-hand man, Christian Scott-Hughes. We feel Sir Bernard might be sympathetic to the climate-technology cause.’
God, he’s transparent. He’s not going to tell me about whatever-it-is on the BlackBerry … so instead he’s offering me some boring old piece of information about climate technology and he thinks that’ll fool me.
‘Fab,’ I say politely.
Actually, I am quite impressed. Sir Bernard Cross is massive. (In both senses: he’s always in the news because of being a billionaire philanthropist with lots of extreme views, and he weighs about twenty-five stone.)
‘Christian Scott-Hughes is Sir Bernard’s executive director and hugely influential,’ Luke is saying. ‘If we can win him round, then we’re a long way down the road.’
‘Why don’t you go and meet Bernard Cross himself?’ I say, and Luke gives a little laugh.