“If it’s okay with you, I’ll tell Evelyn now,” Lucinda said. “It might bring her a little comfort to know that nothing sinister or superstitious is behind her loss.”

Carla agreed that was fine. She finished her tea and washed her cup in the sink, holding it under the running water for longer than was necessary. Lucinda noticed, headed over and turned off the tap. “What else is on your mind? Besides Tom and the baby?”

“You can tell?” Carla turned around to face her. “There is something else,” she eventually admitted. “Something big.”

“I’m all ears, honey. You can tell me anything, and I won’t persuade you to go overseas this time.”

“That would be helpful.” Carla rested her hands gently on Lucinda’s shoulders. “I’ve found my father.”

Lucinda’s mouth fell open. “You have?”

“You’ve already met him, too. He came here with Babs to see you.” Carla confirmed to her gran that Diego was her father.

Lucinda opened and shut her mouth again. “You certainly have been busy. Babs stayed to chat to me about Suzette while Diego went to check into their hotel. Neither of them said a word to me about this...”

“Babs didn’t know at the time. It came as a big shock to her, just as it did to me. Jess found out about it before I had a chance to tell you. She was upset at first, but we’ve worked things out.”

“Well, I never,” Lucinda said, stunned by all this news. “Suzette didn’t utter one word to me about your dad’s identity. I suppose I can understand why she kept her pregnancy a secret from Babs.”

“Diego’s going to explain everything to her.” Carla’s jaw muscles tensed, hoping that Babs was going to be okay. “Did Mum ever tell you who Jess’s dad might be? I think she’d also love to find him one day.”

Lucinda ran a hand across her chin, her thoughts taking her back in time. “I’ll give it some thought, honey. There was one of Suzette’s boyfriends I liked, someone she met while traveling who had red hair, though I don’t know how you might trace him.”

Carla thought back to the photos in Babs’s sitting room and wondered if a mission overseas, to find their mum’s exes, awaited Jess. “If anyone can find him, I think Jess can,” she said.

Thirty-Four

Home

Tom messaged Carla, asking if she’d like to meet him at the house they were supposed to be moving into. She wondered if he’d chosen it as a neutral space to tell her their relationship was over, or if he wanted to check if the place was suitable for a family of three. She replied to say that she would.

Her bones felt like concrete when she arrived early and let herself inside. She and Tom both had a set of keys.

She took off her shoes and meandered around downstairs in her socked feet. The living room and kitchen looked much pokier than she remembered, and the furniture included in the rental package was all the same insipid shade of gray.

As hard as she tried, Carla couldn’t picture herself sitting on the tiny sofa, bouncing a baby on her knee while Tom made brunch in the cramped kitchen. She couldn’t hear the clatter of saucepans and a ring of laughter. She looked all around her and knew there wasn’t enough space to store all of Tom’s board games. Through the back door, she saw the narrow strip of paving stones that could never be described as a “patio garden.” The house was located at the side of a busy road, not a good place for a child to play outside. Perhaps they’d been too giddy about moving in together when they’d agreed to the rental terms. They’d both thought the house was cute and cozy rather than tiny.

Carla went upstairs, where images chosen by the leasing agent lined the walls, artful black-and-white shots of palm trees and sunsets. In the main bedroom, she didn’t feel any glimmer of attraction to the pristine carpet and the bed’s leather headboard. She couldn’t imagine her and Tom snuggling under the covers as man and wife.

She knew this was no longer the right home for her, or a baby, so where did that leave her and Tom? She’d sold her own apartment, and the new buyers would move in soon. There was hardly enough space in Tom’s compact house for two people to live there, never mind with a baby.

Sitting down heavily on the bed, Carla wrung her hands together. Her insides churned as she waited for Tom to arrive. If he told her they were over, confirmed they weren’t compatible, she felt like she might crumble into a pile of dust. She had so much explaining to do it made her head spin, and she still hadn’t told him the date of Bertrand’s funeral yet.

When she heard his keys rattle in the front door, she sat up with her back straight and stiff, listening for his footsteps on the stairs. Each creak made her heart pound faster.

Carla held her breath as the bedroom door opened, and then there he was, her fiancé, her friend and the father of her child. “Tom.”

He looked both familiar and like a stranger, with a hint of a tan, stubble on his chin and purple semicircles under his eyes. His arms hung by his sides, and a small black gift bag hung from one finger. “I stopped at your gran’s place first, to drop off a sympathy card for Evelyn. It’s so awful about her fiancé. I’m so very sorry,” he said. “It’s nice your family have gathered around to look after her. This gift had arrived for you, and I said I’d bring it here.”

“It doesn’t look like a wedding present,” Carla observed.

“That’s what I thought, too.” Tom set it down next to her on the bed.

She hoped that he’d join her, really needing a hug from him. Instead, he retreated and leaned a shoulder against the door frame.

“How was your journey home?” she asked him.

“It took a long time, eighteen hours from door to door.” Tom turned his head, so he wasn’t looking at her. His mouth was set hard and he rubbed his nose as if summoning up the courage to tell her something. “I’ve been thinking it doesn’t feel right to go ahead with our wedding after your aunt’s loss,” he said, getting straight to the point. “It feels like yet another thing telling us not to go ahead.”

Although Carla knew he was right, she still felt like she had a rock lodged in her throat. It hurt when she tried to swallow, and she didn’t even have the strength to nod her head. “Did gran mention the funeral date to you?”

“No,” he said with suspicion in his voice. “Why?”

Carla sighed. “Evelyn arranged it to take place on our wedding day. She was in such shock she didn’t realize the date at the time. Mimi tried to change it, but...” There was no point telling Tom about the option of postponing it for a week when the decision had already been made.

“Well, that’s the final nail in the coffin for our wedding day,” he said. Then his grim expression turned to one of horror. “Sorry, I didn’t intend that terrible pun.”

“It’s okay.”

“So, it’s definitely off?” He hung his head.

“Yes. Sorry.”

“Me, too.”

For a while the only sound in the room was their breathing.

Eventually, Tom lifted his chin. “Perhaps Evelyn can use our wedding reception as a wake for Bertrand. We’ve ordered and paid for all that lovely food and it’d be a shame for it to go to waste.”

Carla’s belly plunged even further. In the back of her mind, she’d hoped there’d be another way forward for her and Tom, even if she didn’t know what it might be. “That’s a thoughtful idea. Thank you. If Evelyn’s fine with that, I’ll get in touch with the caterers to see if they can offer a buffet rather than a sit-down meal. I’ll need to cancel the silver balloons, too.” She tried to think of other things she needed to do but her brain felt like it was filled with soup.

Tom looked up at the light fixture, a simple glass dome, and Carla noticed a cobweb drifting from it, long and fragile.

“Everything’s stacked against us,” he said. “Our match on Logical Love was wrong, you’ve been running around after your exes, and now this.” He slid down the wall and sat on the carpet with his legs stretched out in front of him. “My parents are arriving later today. I’m going to pick them up from the airport.”

Carla looked up. “Oh, I could—” She started to offer to join him, but Tom shook his head.

“It’s fine. I’ll get them. I’ve not seen them for a few months and it will be nice to catch up...”

Without you. She could tell he’d left those words off the end of his sentence, and they were noticeable in their absence.

“I’m not looking forward to telling them about all this,” he added.

“Have you told them about the baby?”

His eyes lifted for the briefest moment. “Not yet. I wanted to talk to you about things first. It’s probably best to tell them our wedding is off first and let that sink in. I’ll let everything settle for a while.”

Settle, Carla thought, picturing how pith floated in homemade lemonade. It never vanished. It only sank. “I’ve made an appointment for a scan,” she said. “The week after the funeral.”