The Subsequent Wife Read online

  Contents

  Cover

  Also by Priscilla Masters

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-One

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Chapter Forty-Four

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Also by Priscilla Masters

  The Martha Gunn mysteries

  RIVER DEEP

  SLIP KNOT

  FROZEN CHARLOTTE *

  SMOKE ALARM *

  THE DEVIL’S CHAIR *

  RECALLED TO DEATH *

  BRIDGE OF SIGHS *

  The Joanna Piercy mysteries

  WINDING UP THE SERPENT

  CATCH THE FALLEN SPARROW

  A WREATH FOR MY SISTER

  AND NONE SHALL SLEEP

  SCARING CROWS

  EMBROIDERING SHROUDS

  ENDANGERING INNOCENTS

  WINGS OVER THE WATCHER

  GRAVE STONES

  A VELVET SCREAM *

  THE FINAL CURTAIN *

  GUILTY WATERS *

  CROOKED STREET *

  BLOOD ON THE ROCKS *

  The Claire Roget mysteries

  DANGEROUS MINDS *

  THE DECEIVER *

  A GAME OF MINDS *

  * available from Severn House

  THE SUBSEQUENT WIFE

  Priscilla Masters

  This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

  First world edition published in Great Britain and the USA in 2021

  by Severn House, an imprint of Canongate Books Ltd,

  14 High Street, Edinburgh EH1 1TE.

  Trade paperback edition first published in Great Britain and the USA in 2022

  by Severn House, an imprint of Canongate Books Ltd.

  This eBook edition first published in 2021 by Severn House,

  an imprint of Canongate Books Ltd.

  severnhouse.com

  Copyright © Priscilla Masters, 2021

  All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. The right of Priscilla Masters to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs & Patents Act 1988.

  British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

  A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

  ISBN-13: 978-0-7278-5059-1 (cased)

  ISBN-13: 978-1-78029-798-9 (trade paper)

  ISBN-13: 978-1-4483-0537-7 (e-book)

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Except where actual historical events and characters are being described for the storyline of this novel, all situations in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is purely coincidental.

  This eBook produced by

  Palimpsest Book Production Limited,

  Falkirk, Stirlingshire, Scotland

  ONE

  Wednesday 14 September 2016, 9 p.m.

  Four Seasons Wine Bar, Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire

  I blame Stella, to some extent. She drew attention to my single state, encouraged me to take this course. She was supposed to be my best friend but her bird’s-eye view on my life so far was making me seethe.

  We were on our fourth glass of red wine when she started. ‘If only you could meet a decent man, Jenny,’ she said in that irritatingly reedy voice. She took another sip while I waited for the next dart. ‘I mean, so far your romances have been a disaster, haven’t they?’

  I scanned the wine bar and didn’t fancy my chances tonight.

  ‘Let’s face it, Jen,’ she continued. ‘There’s no talent around Stoke. They’re all married and on the cheat or else a load of wankers, or they wouldn’t notice you unless you were an actual football.’

  I followed her scan of the wine bar. Carefully and slowly, 360 degrees, all the way around the wine bar. The lights were dim with strobes flashing around the room like lightning strikes, illuminating for seconds at a time even the darkest, dingiest little corner (which looked full of suspicious creeps and/or surreptitious snoggers), so a proper detailed survey was a bit tricky. But I could vaguely make out a couple of porkers, bellies on knees, thick thighs manspread wide on high bar stools, slurping down pints with all the manners of pigs at the trough who haven’t seen food for a couple of months, banging their glasses on the bar to get the barman’s attention. A definite no-no. Nothing there.

  I moved on. There were a couple of gays holed up in the corner, looking lovey-dovey. I smirked. No chance there either. Another movement brought into focus numerous couples so absorbed in each other they could have been anywhere – from the sinking Titanic to the Costa del Sol to here, in the seediest wine bar imaginable in downtown Hanley. Get a room, I was tempted to shout over. But they wouldn’t have heard me anyway. Not above the thump-thump of the music and the racket of everyone bellowing at each other as though we were in a home for the deaf.

  I scoured the other corner.

  That held a clump of marauding males, all muscles and tattoos, red-and-white-striped Stoke City shirts, and I could smell their aftershave from across the room. They looked a bit hot and ready for me. I’d had my fill of hot and ready men. Women are on the lookout for them just as they are on the lookout for fresh meat. Hot men get nicked from right under your nose. It’s happened to me a time or two, going to a party as half of a couple and wandering home alone, sobbing and without a lift. I turned away from them.

  I’ve tried the internet too and that turned out to be a waste of time.

  3 × Boring

  10 × Waste of time

  and 2 × Bloody Scary.

  If I was to change my life, I needed to do something drastic.

  I’d finished searching the wine bar for talent and was back to Stella knowing she was right. The answer wasn’t her
e. So where was it? The life I wanted. Home, husband, baby – in that order. Maybe it was more precious to me because I idealized something I’d never really had.

  I leaned in a bit closer so she could actually hear what I was saying over the thumpety-thump of the base, which vibrated the entire floor as though we were having an earthquake. Stoke has had a couple of minor earthquakes. Caused by the extensive coal mining, so they said. But maybe it was more to do with the bass thumping out of places like this.

  ‘To tell you the truth, Stell,’ I confided, ‘I’m having serious doubts there even is a Mr Right for me.’

  ‘Nonsense,’ she said. ‘There’s a Mr Right for everyone. You’re not looking hard enough, Jen. And you’re not looking in the right places.’

  ‘Where are the right places?’

  She looked put out. ‘I don’t know,’ she said, slightly irritated. ‘You just bump into them.’

  I persisted. I was not about to let her off the hook. ‘Where?’ I said again.

  ‘Work?’ she tried.

  I almost guffawed at that. ‘Work? At The Stephanie Wright Home for the Bewildered? That’s how I met David Ganger. And look what happened there.’

  Flushed with my job and – sort of – home, I’d had a certain confidence. I was eighteen years old then and a size eight. My hair was striped like a tiger on heat, straightened, down to my shoulders, little flicks at the side, and the night I met him I’d got my make-up just right. What I’m saying is: I was hot. And I knew it.

  I’d met David at the same place where Stella and I had worked. Just after I’d left school with my ‘disappointing’ GCSE results, she and I had started work at The Stephanie Wright Care Home for the elderly infirm. We called it The Home for the Bewildered because that’s what they were. It was full of sweet, middle-class old biddies and retired army blokes. David’s granny was a patient there. She had dementia but you could tell she’d been a lady. Once. She had a refined way of talking and nice manners – most of the time.

  Only recently she’d developed a habit of resorting to bad language if she didn’t get her own way. Like, ‘Where’s my fucking cup of tea?’

  It sounded funny in her posh accent, but I resented being called, ‘You ridiculous little slut.’ However, I grinned and bore it – for David’s sake. But even I found it hard not to react when she had a real nasty temper tantrum and actually reached out with her bony hands, smacking and pinching anyone in the firing line. Maybe that should have warned me that her grandson could carry the same nasty gene.

  But …

  David was a gorgeous-looking guy. Tall, well built, very good looking. A few tattoos here and there but nothing excessive. No Cut Here or Love and Hate. He had nice brown eyes, very smooth skin for a bloke and a cheeky, challenging grin. He worked as a mechanic at his father’s garage and drove a really cool sports car. Postbox red. He was a catch. Unfortunately, I wasn’t the only girl who thought so. There was a whole string of them, like pearls on a particularly long and decorative necklace, and he liked to spread himself around a bit. But the worst thing about David was that he was a really good liar. Even when I caught him out, chatting away to someone on the phone, responding to texts with that look in his eye, he could look right back, square on, and swear it was a mate from work. It didn’t sound like that to me. But because his lovely brown eyes looked into mine with such ‘sincerity’, I believed him – at first.

  He was smart too. His girlfriends. Correction. His other girlfriends were all listed in his phonebook under fella’s names – I was ‘Dean’, I found out later. There were always a lot of unanswered calls and wrong numbers on his phone. It was only when a girl called Whitney called me one day and asked me what the hell I was doing with her guy that the penny finally dropped. Whitney came round while he was at the gym and she and I sat down on the sofa with his phone that I’d nicked earlier when he’d been in the shower. ‘Brian’ turned out to be Amanda, Whitney was ‘William’, a girl called Fallon was listed as ‘Fred’, and so on.

  I didn’t want to dump him, and when he assured me that he was done with playing around I really wanted to believe him. But in my heart of hearts I suppose I knew. He was a cheat and always would be.

  He had his grandmother’s nasty temper too and that night, for the first time, he blacked my eye and thumped me in the tummy. It hurt for days and I plotted my revenge. I didn’t have to actually do it myself. All I had to do was ring round and explain just what David’s little tricks were. I’d sensed Whitney had a bad streak in her (she’d cursed and threatened vengeance with a degree of heat), and I was right. She took a knife to him and poor old David had to have a colostomy because she’d sliced through his bowel. That was all I’d had to do. Make the right call. Sometimes it’s that easy to get even.

  I didn’t go to see him in hospital. In fact, I never saw him again.

  ‘I don’t think The Stephanie Wright Care Home is going to supply Prince Charming,’ I said.

  ‘Well, change jobs then,’ she said crossly, and slammed her wine glass back on the table. ‘Go somewhere where you will meet men. Decent men.’

  I leaned back on my bar stool, sensing hostility now, watching her through my extended and thickened, rather heavy false eyelashes. I wasn’t sure I wanted this lecture.

  I was going to hear it anyway. She sniffed but patted my hand. I was forgiven. ‘You’re only twenty-one, Jen. I know you desperately want your own family but there’s plenty of time to find a good man.’ But then, just to spoil it, she couldn’t resist spending the next fifteen minutes expanding on the subject of my past failures which compared so unfavourably with her smug married state.

  I went home despondent.

  TWO

  All the way home I sat on the bus, staring out through the window, reflecting on my life so far. Stella’s words had raked up the past as though it was a muck heap on a farm, harbouring flies and rats and unholy diseases.

  I had been on my own for eight months after David and I had ‘split up’. It was a turbulent time for me. Actually, the past six years had been a turbulent time for me. When I was fifteen my Dad had moved out, planting the seed of destruction and abandonment deep in my perception of the male sex. He’d been cheating on my mum. Actually she’d been cheating on him too. I’d suffered years of shouting and bitter arguments ever since I was born. I used to stuff cotton wool in my years, but I could still hear it all the time. I tried to bury my head in fairy tales, focusing on the Prince Charmings and blissful Happy-Ever-After creations of fiction writers. Things at home got particularly bad, erupting into noisy slaps, screams and punches while I was trying to scrape a couple of GCSEs. God knows where they were going to lead but there you are. The atmosphere at home was toxic, erupting into homelessness when I was fifteen, which is why I fluffed my exams, leaving Miss McCormick, my English teacher ‘very disappointed’. ‘You were my big hope,’ she’d said sadly, ‘one of the reasons I teach. To help children from deprived backgrounds climb out of the bearpit. You had the ability to study at university but you’ve made a mess of things, Jenny.’ After that I couldn’t ever face her again; neither could I face school. I was recast from victim to disappointment.

  There had never been a realistic chance of my passing A levels and I certainly couldn’t go to university. I blamed both my parents for this. Selfish mother. Selfish father. They got divorced soon after and both got involved with their paramours. They didn’t find much happiness there either. And they forgot about me.

  So back to that rainy evening and The Four Seasons Wine Bar. You see I was a ripe apple, ready to drop from the tree, lie on the grass, and be attacked and assaulted by slugs and wasps until I rotted.

  I decided I would change jobs.

  THREE

  Two months after the night at the wine bar, I left the nursing home where I’d worked since leaving school. An old lady had aimed a particularly smelly fart in my face when I was wiping her bottom after a large bowel movement before pulling up her drawers. And that was that. I�
�m not a proud sort of person but even I don’t think I was put on this earth to have old ladies blow off right in my face. So I pinched the offending anatomy hard and before I could change my mind marched to the matron’s office and gave in my notice. Which left me with an obvious problem.

  I’d been there almost three years. I didn’t have a job to go to, no savings (you’re having a laugh, right?); as I’d walked out I would not be entitled to unemployment benefit. And to top it all I had no references. Neither did I have a bank of mum and dad. They had gone their separate, selfish ways.

  I lived in a flat – all right then, I lived in a rented room in a two-bedroomed terraced house in a lovely little village called Brown Edge. It might not sound much, but Brown Edge looks over one of the most beautiful valleys in the world and if you climb out of it you are instantly in the Staffordshire Moorlands. Aka heaven. High, exposed moorland, Staffordshire’s response to the Brontës. I shared the house with a young couple called Jason and Jodi who were struggling to manage their mortgage so had advertised a room to rent. My £300 a month kept their heads just floating above water. I started off happy there. They were a nice couple. Quiet. No rows, tantrums or breaking glass. But I had a horrible feeling they were thinking of starting a family, which would lose me a very nice room of my own with a view across heaven’s valley, a view at one time threatened by a Mr Budge, who’d wanted to churn the whole valley up for open-cast mining. He failed in his bid. So it was still a green and pleasant land. My room wasn’t big but it was square, had a wardrobe, dressing table and chest of drawers and, best of all? That view, better than any picture! And it was only a short downhill walk across fields to the Greenway Bank Country Park: two pools and the source of the River Trent. On hot days an ice-cream van parked on the bridge.

  But having made the snap decision to walk out of The Stephanie Wright Care Home, I had a problem. No job, no money and imminently no home, because Jodi and Jason would soon be wanting the next month’s rent. They were tight for money and would easily be able to rent my room to someone who could afford to pay. Who hadn’t walked out of their job.