Behind Closed Doors by Susan Lewis Page A

though she’d heard talk of nothing else since they’d got up that morning, Kasia said, ‘How wonderful. Will she eat all her meals out there and invite friends in to play?’
    Anton nodded. ‘She promised to invite me in, and you have to keep promises, don’t you?’ He was looking at Tomasz.
    ‘You most certainly do,’ Tomasz agreed. ‘Now, I want you to go and make sure you know exactly where we should put the house, while I run upstairs to book a flight.’
    Anton’s eyes rounded. ‘Where are you going?’ he asked worriedly.
    ‘To see my mummy in Poland, but I won’t be gone for long, and I promise, even if we haven’t finished the house before your bedtime, it will be all done and waiting when you get up in the morning.’
    As Anton skipped back down the garden and Tomasz went to unpack their new laptop, Kasia returned to folding the washing. Since there were flights to Krakow every day from Bristol, she guessed he would try to get on one in the morning. This would mean him leaving home at around six, and if he received a call-out at one of the Poynters’ businesses between now and then he would have to go. Still, even if it meant staying up all night, she knew he’d make sure the playhouse was finished before he left.
    The glow of the love in her heart was as precious to her as the gift of her children, as meaningful as the communion she took every Sunday. She had so much to thank God for, so many reasons to feel blessed. She had never thought it possible to find so much kindness in a man after all she’d suffered at the hands of her husband. Thankfully, he had no idea where she was now, her parents would never tell him, nor would he be sober for long enough to try and find out. It was one of the great tragedies of her country, the number of men who drank themselves to oblivion, many of them ending up committing suicide, or collapsing in the snow and dying of cold.
    Tomasz was nothing like that. He was strong and honest and brave and had no need of alcohol or anything else to provide an escape, because he had nothing to escape from.
    Tonight she would say a special prayer for his mother – and add another for Tomasz to come safely back to her.

Chapter Four
    IT CAME AS no small relief to Andee to discover that Estelle Morris seemed genuinely worried about Sophie. Here at last was someone, other than Sophie’s parents, who apparently cared about the girl and where she might be. This was presuming, of course, that Estelle wasn’t putting on an act, and Andee certainly hadn’t ruled that out yet.
    ‘I kept saying we ought to ring the police,’ Estelle was telling them as she led Andee and Leo into a front room that smelled, as well as looked, as though it had recently undergone a vigorous sprucing. Estelle’s mother smiled a greeting as they came in. Andee wondered if she’d ever seen so many ornaments. It would hurt her head to try and identify them all: a china sombrero with matching maracas, three wise monkeys from Tenerife, a wooden camel train from Tunisia, and a boogieing crocodile that snapped at her ankles as she passed the grate was as far as she was prepared to go.
    ‘Did you say that to Heidi Monroe?’ Leo was asking as he perched on the edge of a purple armchair, while Andee took its partner the other side of the gas fire.
    Estelle flushed awkwardly. She was a sweet-looking girl with similar purple hair to Sophie’s – no doubt an adventure embarked upon together – and golden-brown eyes that showed how young she really was. ‘No, I only said it to my mum,’ she admitted. ‘I mean, I knew there was a chance she was with her dad, but even if she was I couldn’t understand why she wasn’t answering my texts.’
    ‘Did you try calling her?’
    ‘Yeah, loads of times, but I just kept getting her voicemail.’
    Andee said, ‘Is there another friend she might have contacted, or perhaps gone to stay with?’
    Estelle’s eyes went to her mother, who was sitting on the arm of the