Tears stream down her face. She makes no attempt to wipe them away as I reach for my bag and fumble around for a pack of tissues.

“I’m sorry,” she says. “I miss her so much. She had children. It was so unfair. I took it out on you and blamed you for being alive when she wasn’t. I knew it wasn’t right, but I couldn’t stop myself. But...”

With Deborah there is always a but, she can’t help herself. She accepts a tissue from me.

“Why would I trust you?” she asks.

“Good question.” I place my hand on my stomach. “Because this child will be the half sibling of your grandchildren. I know you don’t agree with me and Stuart, and I do understand why, but my intentions are good.”

She doesn’t look convinced.

“Stuart knows, Camilla knows, I know. But I would like to have heard it from Nina, so you are the next best thing. I should’ve known right from the beginning that she’d have confided in you.”

She wipes her cheeks and beneath her eyes. “How are things with Stuart?”

The tone she chooses to use alerts me to the fact that she knew something else, too. Something about Nina and Stuart’s relationship.

“Stuart’s Stuart,” I say.

“What did he tell you?”

“Not much. I was shocked that he knew.”

I tell her all that has happened. It feels nice to have Deborah back in my life, a second mum. I hate how badly our relationship has deteriorated.

“Stuart covered it up,” she says.

“He couldn’t have. Stuart wasn’t there. His holiday ended sooner, so he left before it all happened.”

“He flew back, inviting an unsuspecting friend for a long weekend away as a guise. Nina and Camilla had forgotten a cooler on the boat and Nina was afraid that when it was discovered on the boat by the owner, another friend of Stuart’s, that he’d realize it had been taken out, that it might then lead to further investigations. Stuart and his friend took a day trip. Afterward he gave the boat a thorough clean.”

“Does Camilla know?”

“No, as far as I know, I imagine Stuart assumes his secret died with Nina.” She pauses. “I’d keep it that way if I were you.”

“Why?”

“Knowledge is power,” she says in a rehearsed-sounding way.

“I will keep it to myself, but still, I need more than that.”

“It’s how he got her to marry him so quickly, so young. He did this massive thing for her and Nina cared for him. He loved her. He knew the truth. She felt indebted, greatly so. I didn’t know at the time—she didn’t tell me until years later.”

“He told me he’d felt duped, that—”

“Stuart doesn’t like being single. When he met Nina, he was married. Estranged, but married, nonetheless. Meeting Nina encouraged him to rush through with the divorce.”

“Oh my God. How can I not know that?”

“Nina didn’t like to make it common knowledge.”