Free The Power of One by Jane A. Adams

with?’
    â€˜Oh, Rina.’ Eliza laughed coquettishly. ‘Outside of the people in this room, oh and apart from Tim, of course, there’s only one person you’d get upset over and that’s our policeman. We aren’t entirely blind, you know.’
    â€˜Or lacking in empathy,’ Matthew finished. He laid down his hand of cards. ‘So why don’t we give up on this pretence of a game and I’ll pour us all some nice G&Ts and you can tell us what’s stopping you from enjoying our family evening.’
    Relieved but also reluctant, Rina laid down her cards and allowed Steven to administer alcoholic balm. Bethany’s notion of Tim being big brotherish amused her; though, she admitted, sometimes he seemed like one of the elders.
    â€˜It was nothing really,’ she said. ‘Mac was trying to do his job and I suppose I was overstepping the mark a little.’
    â€˜Oh, but you always do that,’ Bethany exclaimed. ‘He doesn’t usually mind.’
    â€˜And you know he’ll come and say sorry just as soon as he’s able to,’ Eliza added. ‘And eat cake and get back to plotting with you and Tim and everything will be fine again.’
    â€˜Of course he will,’ Matthew reassured. ‘And if he doesn’t realise he’s upset you, Tim will tell him your feelings were hurt and he’ll come round at once. Sebastian would never let a little police formality come between you.’
    Sebastian, Rina thought. Matthew was the only person who ever called Mac by his given name and it was a mark of regard, she knew, that Mac merely winced.
    â€˜Right, so now we have that settled,’ Steven said, ‘I believe there’s a Hitchcock film on one of the cable channels. Shall we?’
    Lydia stood in the Big Room staring at the dark as it crept landward across the stretch of steel-grey ocean. Pale streaks of sky broke up the inky blue and the last echoes of the day’s sun touched pink at the very tips of the cloud. It would rain, she thought. Later tonight or in the early morning, drenching the garden. The thought relieved her; she knew that Edward’s beloved roses needed watering and the bedding plants were crisping in the summer heat but the thought of leaving the house, even for the relative shelter of her own green space, terrified her just now. Inside, she didn’t exactly feel safe, but at least less threatened and in this room, with its vertiginous view of sea and sky she could imagine, almost, that she floated above the world and its troubles.
    More practically, she couldn’t see the wilting flowers.
    The door opened and Edward came slowly down the steps into the sunken room. He crossed to where she stood and laid his hands hesitantly on her shoulders.
    â€˜It’s like being on the prow of a ship, this room,’ Lydia said. ‘I used to imagine that’s what Paul liked so much. That feeling of floating above and beyond it all. Nothing to see but open water and that big sky.’ She sighed, suddenly sick of the sight that had fascinated her only seconds before. ‘Can’t we move, Edward. I can’t stand this place now. It didn’t save him, did it. Getting away from everything. I thought, being aboard
The Greek Girl
he should have been safe. He should have been …’
    â€˜I know. I know.’ He hugged her, awkwardly, as though he’d almost forgotten how. ‘Lydia, we knew he was in trouble. We should have forced him to tell us what was going on.’
    â€˜It isn’t just him, though, is it? Those phone calls, those threats. Edward, if I knew what they wanted, they could have it but I don’t. I’m scared enough to give them just about anything they want, but how can we when Paul never told us …’
    Edward couldn’t think what to say. She leaned against him, hands tight on his arms as though unable to stand unless he held her.
    â€˜We have to tell