‘And Hope?’

  ‘She knows too. I told her. How could I not? We’ve just been waiting for the right moment to tell you.’

  ‘But how did Mum know that you were in York?’ Romany asked. She was trying to link all the pieces together, but this bit was missing.

  ‘We think she saw me at Hope’s thirtieth party, but we don’t know for sure. That was the only thing we could think of that would connect all the dots.’

  Romany sat and thought for a while as the café hummed around her. Her head was spinning with it all, but she could see that it did fit together.

  ‘Tiger recognised you, at Christmas,’ she said.

  ‘Yeah, I thought he might have done. I’ve been waiting for it to come to a head since then. But I wanted you to be in charge, Romany. It had to come from you. It was only when it looked like Tiger wasn’t going to say anything that I gave you a little nudge.’

  Romany thought back to the journey home from the fashion shoot. It had been so subtle, his hint. She might easily have missed it.

  ‘And there you have it,’ he said. ‘The whole sorry tale. I imagine you’ll need some time now, to think it through, decide what you want to do. There’s no pressure from me, Romany. I can be as involved in your life as you like. Or not at all, if that’s what you choose.’

  Romany scraped at the remains of the froth in the bottom of her glass with her spoon. She had no idea what she wanted to do, what her future might look like, whether he would be a part of it or not. But she liked him. He had been straight with her, she thought. Told her the truth. And that must count for something.

  ‘Okay,’ she said.

  56

  Romany hadn’t told Tiger that she was going to meet Daniel. She hadn’t wanted him to worry and she wasn’t sure she needed the inevitable questioning that would follow. But as she let herself back into the flat, she wished that she had done. She needed someone to talk it all through with, but she couldn’t be bothered with going back to the start, with what she had thought up until today. She just wanted to dive straight in with what had just happened without any preamble or explanation. But Tiger wasn’t great with anything emotional. He would just crack some corny joke or other.

  Maybe Maggie would be a better choice of listener. Romany had always found her easy to talk to in the past and she generally said something sensible, even if it wasn’t what Romany wanted to hear. But Maggie was too close to her mum. She would judge Daniel for leaving them at the start and then staying away for all that time. And her anger at him for that action would skew her view. No, Maggie wasn’t the right person. And anyway, she thought, her mum had left Maggie in charge of all things legal. This wasn’t in her brief.

  No, her mum had given Hope responsibility for relationships, a decision that had made no sense at the time but now seemed obvious. This was Hope’s moment. But could she talk to Hope about Daniel? She didn’t want to cause any problems between them. It wouldn’t be fair. Then again, Daniel had said that Hope knew the whole story, and it wasn’t as if he had ever been going out with Hope and her mum at the same time.

  Romany picked up her phone and messaged her. The reply came almost instantly.

  Yes. Meet for a walk on the walls? 6.30 Monk Bar?

  Romany texted straight back agreeing to the arrangement.

  It was lunchtime, so she had hours to kill until then. Tiger was in the bathroom repotting bedding plants for a window box. The flat had no outside space but he had fashioned a way of securing the boxes to the windowsills and was now using the bath to keep the compost under control whilst he planted red geraniums between some tiny blue flowers that Romany didn’t know the name of. He knelt on the floor, bent over the bath as he worked.

  ‘They look pretty,’ she said as she stood in the doorway and watched him.

  ‘Thanks,’ he said without turning round. ‘When I was in Aix-en-Provence picking lavender one year, I loved how all the houses had window boxes with geraniums in them. I know it’s not quite the same here, but I thought they might look nice.’

  ‘They’re lovely,’ she said. ‘A treat for the neighbours though. We won’t see much of them from in here.’

  ‘No,’ Tiger agreed. ‘Maybe one day we could think about moving to somewhere with a little garden. I could grow some herbs, maybe a bit of salad.’

  He didn’t look at her as he spoke. This was the first time either of them had mentioned what might happen after she finished school. The whole focus of her mum’s letter had been to keep her safe whilst she completed her A levels. She had done that now, and before too long she would be nineteen and hopefully going to Durham to study. What might happen after that hadn’t been on her radar, but she had always known that Tiger would leave. It never occurred to her that he might be thinking about new places for them to live in together.

  ‘Won’t you want to get back on with your travelling?’ she asked. ‘I thought you had a plan. Guatemala, wasn’t it?’

  ‘I missed that one,’ he said.

  ‘But there’ll be others, though. Surely,’ Romany said.

  Tiger shrugged. ‘Travelling isn’t the be all and end all,’ he said. ‘Sometimes it’s nice to stay put for a bit. Put down some roots.’

  He still wasn’t looking at her, as if he didn’t want to see her reaction. She wasn’t at all sure how to respond. She had just assumed that he would leave her. Wasn’t that what Laura going to Newcastle was all about, a safety net for her so that she wouldn’t be entirely alone? Tiger would pick up his travels where he had left off and she would live in the flat on her own, with Maggie and Leon, and possibly now Daniel and Hope keeping an eye on her, ready to step in and help in case of disaster.

  ‘What are you saying, Tiger?’ she asked him.

  ‘Nothing, really,’ he said, full of bluff. ‘Nothing.’

  But he was. Romany could see it written all over his body language.

  ‘Stop doing that a minute,’ she said. ‘Talk to me.’

  Slowly he got to his feet, stretching and rubbing at the small of his back. He turned to face her. He looked anxious, nervous even. Romany didn’t recognise it and wasn’t sure she liked it. This wasn’t who Tiger was. He was the joker in her pack, light-hearted and never taking anything too seriously, least of all himself. He stuffed his dirty hands into his jeans pockets and looked at his feet.

  ‘Are you saying that you’d rather stay here than go back on the road?’ she asked him.

  ‘Well,’ he began. ‘It’s kind of taken me by surprise, how much I’ve loved being here. It’s cool, making a home. I started trying to make stuff nice for you, but then I really got into it.’

  ‘You’re really good at it,’ said Romany. ‘I mean, just look at this place. It’s never looked so good. Mum would be amazed!’

  Tiger gave a little laugh, more a huff than anything. ‘Yeah, she wasn’t that big on that kind of stuff, your mum. And I got to thinking that maybe I’ve had enough of not being based anywhere. Don’t get me wrong. I still want to be out there. There’s so much to see. But perhaps I’m ready to do it in smaller bites, more like a holiday than a way of life. God, listen to me. I sound so bloody middle-aged.’

  He rolled his eyes, laughing at himself, but Romany thought she saw something else. He really wanted her to understand, to say that he could stay. This new plan was entirely dependent on her say-so.

  She didn’t hesitate. ‘That would be fantastic!’ she said. ‘I’d love it!’

  She opened her arms and threw them around his shoulders. She could feel him relax as she hugged him, as if he had been building up to this moment for a while and was deeply relieved that it was finally out in the open.

  When they separated, he said, ‘I don’t mean that we have to move. That was just an idea. Obviously, this was your mum’s place and it’s full of all her memories.’

  Romany nodded. He was right. It was. But the memories were in her head; in Tiger’s, too. She didn’t need a place to attach them to. In some ways, a fresh start as she went off to university might be perfect timing. It wasn’t like leaving her mum behind, but more taking her with her into her new life.

  ‘I reckon a place with a garden might be nice,’ she said. ‘As long as we’re not too far out of town. I still want to be able to walk home from a night out.’

  Tiger was grinning broadly. ‘Well, maybe we can start looking over the summer,’ he said. ‘Get this place valued and see what we could afford. And I was thinking I could get a job. Maybe be a tour guide around the city. I reckon I’d be good at that.’

  Romany nodded enthusiastically. ‘You would,’ she said. ‘You’d be really good.’

  She tossed his suggestion around in her head for a moment. A part of her was worried that things were changing too fast, that she needed to give herself time to process it all. But then she remembered that this was Tiger. He might have worked out how to use a vacuum cleaner, but he was no Maggie. They wouldn’t be going anywhere fast.

  ‘You know, you should have said what you were thinking before,’ she said.

  Tiger shrugged. ‘I didn’t really know that I was thinking it myself until recently,’ he said. ‘It was something Maggie said. I’m starting to wonder whether your mum didn’t have all this planned out in advance.’

  Romany thought about her conversation with Daniel earlier. She nodded. ‘I’m beginning to think you might be right,’ she said. ‘Listen, Tiger, can I ask you something? Something personal?’

  Tiger looked slightly uncomfortable, but he nodded.

  ‘Tiger’s a nickname, right?’

  Another nod.

  ‘So, what are you actually called?’

  He looked at her, then up at the ceiling, then down at his feet and then finally back at her.

  ‘You have to promise me that you will never call me it,’ he said.

  ‘Okay,’ agreed Romany.

  ‘And you absolutely, under pain of death, must not tell Maggie.’

  Romany nodded.

  He dropped his head and in a very quiet voice whispered, ‘Derek.’

  Romany bit her lip, but not before a snigger escaped.

  57

  Hope stood at the bottom of Monk Bar waiting for Romany. The shops were closing up, the streets full of people picking up last-minute things and tourists all determined to make the most of every moment of their day in historic York. The steps up to the ancient city wall were busy with a stream of visitors coming back down and the evening sun shone on the sandy-coloured stone of the medieval turret, making it glow.

  Hope wasn’t sure what Romany wanted to talk about, but she could guess, and she was prepared. She’d had time to get her head around it all. She had been confused that first day in the solicitor’s. She’d had no idea why she had been invited, and knew none of the others apart from briefly meeting Maggie at her party. So, when the letter had been read out and she learned what Angie had asked of her, it made no sense.

  She had gone home and told Daniel about the strangeness of Angie’s request and he had gone very pale. She supposed later that he could have kept his mouth shut, waited to see how the situation would pan out, but he’d chosen not to. He had made her sit down next to him and then he’d told her everything, pausing only to make sure that she was all right as all the details emerged. And she had listened, horrified at first when she thought he might have been seeing both her and Angie at the same time, and then slightly more calmly when it seemed that he hadn’t.

  He had abandoned his child, though. That had taken some time to get her head around. If someone had asked her whether Daniel would be the kind of man to do that, she would have said emphatically no. And yet he had. He had run from his responsibilities.

  Hope had remembered conversations that she and Angie had had in coffee breaks during their course, when Angie had confessed how hard she sometimes found it trying to be both parents to her daughter. She had never moaned about it, that wasn’t her style, but she was running her business and looking after Romany on her own, and Hope had got the impression that it could be a struggle to hold it all together.

  Daniel had been there all the time, and yet not there. Angie could have made him shoulder his responsibilities but she had chosen to press on alone. And from what Hope had seen, she had done an amazing job of it.

  Hope wondered what Romany made of it all. When she had texted Daniel that morning asking how the meeting had gone he had simply replied, Fine. Speak later, which had told her nothing. She would just have to wait and see what Romany had to say.

  She could see Romany coming down the street towards her, her auburn ponytail bouncing up and down as she walked. She didn’t look as if she had the weight of the world on her shoulders, at least. When she got close enough to see her, she raised an arm in greeting.

  ‘Hi,’ Romany said, her smile broad, and Hope relaxed a little. Well, it seemed she wasn’t angry.

  ‘Shall we go up?’ Hope asked, and they climbed the steep stone steps through the bar to the ancient wall above.

  After the hustle and bustle of the streets below, it felt calmer and quieter on the wall. Hope looked across the city set out below them, a mixture of ancient and modern architecture with the Minster overseeing it all. It really was a beautiful place.

  ‘So,’ she said as they fell into step alongside each other, ‘you spoke to Daniel.’

  Romany nodded.

  ‘And?’

  ‘I want to be angry with him,’ Romany said. ‘He basically deserted us, so Mum had to cope on her own. But . . .’

  ‘It’s hard when he’s so honest about it?’ Hope suggested.

  ‘Precisely. He’s so up front about what he did wrong. He’s not a bit defensive. He didn’t even try to make any excuses, or anything.’

  ‘No,’ Hope agreed. ‘The way he told me, he didn’t want a baby and Angie understood that. Having you was her agenda, not his. She seemed to understand that that might mean she’d lose him. It was a choice she made, I assume. And I think Daniel would have been in touch eventually, if he’d known where to find you.’

  Romany looked sceptical and Hope saw a flash of anger flare in her eyes, but she stayed calm.

  ‘Well, he could have found us if he’d wanted. It’s not hard to find people these days. He didn’t want to, but that’s okay. I think I understand where he was coming from.’

  ‘He came to York, though,’ said Hope. ‘That was about you, I think.’

  Romany nodded. ‘He seems like a nice bloke to me,’ she said. ‘Is he?’

  Hope wasn’t sure what she expected her to say. They had been together for nearly ten years. It must be obvious that she thought that.

  ‘Yes, he’s a good man,’ she said. ‘He has a good heart.’

  Romany shot a glance at her out of the corner of her eye. ‘He’s quite a lot older than you, isn’t he?’ she asked shyly.

  ‘Fifteen years,’ Hope said.

  ‘Are you going to have any kids?’ Romany asked with a grin. ‘They’d be my half-brothers or sisters.’ She sounded like the idea was growing on her, but Hope shook her head emphatically.

  ‘Nope. Kids are not on the agenda.’

  Romany shrugged. ‘Oh well,’ she said. ‘No new family for me. Easy come, easy go, eh!’

  ‘Sorry,’ said Hope, but Romany was smiling. She didn’t look bothered that there would be no siblings. ‘So,’ Hope continued. ‘What are you thinking? About Daniel, I mean.’

  ‘About whether I want him in my life?’ Romany asked.

  Hope nodded. She wasn’t sure what she wanted the answer to be. She had liked their life the way it was, without a child in it, although Romany was hardly a child. Having her there added a layer of complexity to the relationship that hadn’t been present before. That said, there had been a change in Daniel since September, when Angie’s letter had first been read at the solicitor’s. Even though it had taken a further nine months to finally get to speak to his daughter, just knowing that it would happen at some point in the future seemed to have given him an extra sense of purpose. If Romany took him into her life, then that would be another positive. Hope knew that Daniel felt bad about what he had done, even though Angie had accepted that he wouldn’t be in their lives. Maybe, if Romany welcomed him back, that guilt would lift. He had missed the first eighteen years of her life but that didn’t mean that he had to miss the rest.

  Romany cocked her head to one side as she thought about the question.

  ‘I think we should play it by ear,’ she said.

  58

  The champagne cork popped, and Maggie laughed as the pale liquid squirted out of the bottle and all over Tiger’s shirt.

  ‘I told you not to shake it,’ she said, but Tiger just laughed at her.

  ‘You, Maggie Summers, are the most sensible person I ever met,’ he said. ‘Who opens champagne without shaking it first?’

  ‘Well, somebody has to be sensible around here,’ she said, but there was a lightness in her tone.

  Tiger poured the champagne into six flutes and they each took one and raised them high. They all looked around at one another, no one quite sure who should make the toast, none of them wanting to claim seniority over the others.

  It was Leon who took the lead. He never stopped surprising her these days.

  ‘Congratulations, Romany,’ he began, ‘for smashing your A levels out of the park. Two A-stars and an A. It’s bloody fantastic and Durham are very lucky to have someone as special as you coming to study.’

  ‘Hear, hear,’ they all chorused loudly.

  ‘Yes,’ added Maggie. ‘To Romany.’

  They all raised their glasses and drank to Romany, although she could barely stand still and was jumping from one foot to the other like a little girl, the champagne threatening to slop out of her glass and on to the neatly clipped grass.

  Maggie had been unsure when Hope suggested that they have the celebratory drinks at her house. She had felt cheated and as if Hope, so newly in Romany’s life, had overstepped the mark by offering, but now that she was here, Maggie could see that it was the perfect spot. With the garden elegantly manicured and the bifold doors open on to the huge white kitchen, it looked like a show house or something from a glossy magazine: the perfect place to make Romany feel special.