The Truth About You by Susan Lewis Page A

me.’
    At that her temper sparked. ‘Don’t be ridiculous. They’re your friends.’
    ‘Yours too.’
    ‘But they come to see you. Tom, what the hell’s going on? Why do you have to go back to London?’
    ‘I told you, I can’t get into it now. We’ll talk tomorrow.’
    ‘No! I want you to tell me. How long are you going to be gone?’
    ‘I’m not sure. Look, I have to go. I need to call Zav to apologise for missing his match . . .’
    ‘Tom!’
    ‘I’ll speak to you later,’ and the line went dead.
    Stunned, Lainey looked at her mobile, then quickly rang him back. ‘He’s turned his bloody phone off,’ she swore as she went straight through to voicemail.
    ‘What’s happening?’ Stacy demanded.
    Lainey shook her head in confusion. ‘I’ve got no idea, except tonight’s off apparently, and he’s going back to London.’
    Looking concerned, Stacy said, ‘It must be something to do with the production. One of the actor’s has gone sick, or the script’s not working.’
    ‘If that’s the case, why didn’t he say so?’ Her thoughts were tangling up in all sorts of suspicions, most of which were snaring on the text.
    Ask your husband about Julia.
    Quickly scrolling to the message, she passed it over for Stacy to read.
    ‘Who’s it from?’ Stacy asked.
    Lainey shook her head.
    Frowning, Stacy read it again. ‘So did you ask him?’
    ‘I didn’t take it seriously until . . . Well, until now, I guess . . .’ She was dialling his number again. Once more she was bumped through to voicemail. ‘He’s not answering,’ she said, clicking off the line. She wasn’t sure what to think, or say, or do next.
    ‘Have you tried calling whoever sent the text?’ Stacy asked. ‘Here, let me,’ and taking the phone back she searched out the number. ‘It’s blocked,’ she declared, after trying.
    Lainey was racking her brains, trying to remember a Julia. In the end her eyes returned to Stacy. ‘Are you thinking what I’m thinking?’ she asked quietly. There was only one explanation that was making any sense, and she really, really didn’t want to go there.
    ‘What I’m doing is trying not to jump to conclusions,’ Stacy informed her.
    Lainey got to her feet.
    ‘Where are you going?’ Stacy asked.
    Lainey shrugged. ‘Home, I suppose.’
    ‘What about tonight’s dinner? I thought you were getting bread . . .’
    ‘I’ll cancel it.’
    Stacy’s eyes widened. ‘Isn’t it a bit late? What about the caterers? They’ll have everything . . .’
    ‘They’ll get paid,’ Lainey interrupted. ‘We’ve had to cancel at short notice before, so they’ll donate the food to a local shelter.’
    ‘Do you want me to come with you?’ Stacy offered.
    Lainey attempted a smile. ‘It’s OK, I’ll be fine. Go and get the old gorgon some flowers, and if she turns out to be a kitten . . . Well, let’s just hope she does.’
    Lainey was experiencing so many strange feelings during the drive home that for long stretches of road she barely noticed where she was going. It seemed as though the world was trying to slip anchor, or to throw her into another dimension, but wasn’t quite managing it.
    Ask your husband about Julia.
    Who had sent the message? Julia herself? Or somebody else?
    She kept hearing Tom saying the name,
Julia,
whispering it like a lover and feeling its sound like music. For her it was a stone, a beat falling out of time.
    Why now? What had made the person who’d sent the text choose this week to contact her? What had happened to make it so urgent, so necessary for Tom to go to her today? Presuming that was where he’d gone. Maybe it wasn’t.
    Their village, Bannerleigh, looked from the air like a flamenco dancer, with arms circled overhead forming both sides of Acacia Avenue, with a green in the middle where local children often played cricket. The bottom end of the narrow high street, where a dozen or more almshouses, a handful of quaint cottages, the pub and its garden, and the