A Perfect Obsession by Caro Fraser Page A

dress.
    Rachel heard Charles moving around upstairs and put on some fresh coffee.
    ‘Come on, Oliver, take the train into the living room. We don’t want Charles falling over it.’ She scooped up Oliver and his train and wrinkled her nose. ‘And let’s get that nappy changed before Daddy comes. He’ll be here any moment.’
    It was what she had been saying to herself for the past hour. Leo usually came no later than half nine when it was his weekend to have Oliver, and she found herself glancing at the clock at ten minute intervals, the knot in her stomach growing ever tighter. She shouldn’t care so much about seeing him, but she did.
    She changed Oliver’s nappy and took it out to the bin, and the crunching sound of wheels on the gravel made her turn in expectation. But it was only the post-office van, with a parcel of books for Charles. She took them in and put them on the kitchen table.
    Charles pulled on some jeans and a faded blue sweatshirt, and gave himself a searching look in the mirror. He thought he looked pretty good for a guy in his mid-forties. All right, the blond hair was going rather grey, and his face looked a bit weather-beaten, particularly after the West Coast sunshine, but the
Radio Times
were putting him on their front coverfor his new series this spring, so that was worth something. The Charlie Dimmock of historical documentary, that’s what I am, thought Charles.
    He went downstairs to the kitchen, humming, where he embraced Rachel with jocular passion and poured himself some coffee. Oliver had made his way back in from the living room, pushing his train on his hands and knees. Charles reached down and ruffled his silky hair.
    ‘Leo not here yet?’ He noticed the parcel of books on the table and picked up the bread knife to open it.
    It was a mild enough enquiry, but something about its redundancy irritated Rachel. ‘I don’t know where he’s got to,’ she replied. ‘I saw him last night but he didn’t say anything about being late. Charles, do you
have
to use the knife? It’s so dangerous. Here, use the scissors.’
    Charles, who didn’t see why it mattered if he used the bread knife, obediently put it down and took the scissors. He was used to these domestic reproofs and took them with his customary good humour. Rachel always got a bit edgy when Oliver was going off for the weekend.
    ‘That must be Leo now,’ said Rachel, glancing up at the sound of a car, something like relief clearing her features. She was unaware that her expression, and the speed with which she moved to open the door and go to greet Leo, told Charles certain things he would rather she had kept hidden. Charles wanted so much to fill the space which Leo had left in her life, wanted Rachel to be as much in love with him as she had been with Leo. But he knew that Leo, despite all the pain he had caused Rachel, or perhaps because of it, was still very special to her. Charles stood at the kitchenwindow, the scissors motionless in his hand, watching as Leo got out of the car and Rachel moved forward, tentative as a girl in love, to greet him. A raw sense of pain and jealousy filled his heart. Absurd, he told himself. He knew he had nothing to fear from Leo. He was her past. Oliver was what they had in common, but Rachel lived here now. She was his, and tonight he would have her all to himself.
    ‘You’re late,’ said Rachel, lifting her hand to shade her eyes from the watery sun. Immediately she knew it sounded like a rebuke. She hadn’t meant to be that way. She would like to have been able to say how glad she was to see him. But that was the way things came out when she was with Leo. ‘I meant I was worried – you know, in case something had happened.’
    Leo closed the car door and stepped, forward to kiss her cheek, a perfunctory, sexless kiss. The very faint scent of his expensive cologne was achingly familiar.
    ‘I met an old friend at that do at the Guards’ Club last night, and I’m afraid we made