Marriage and Other Games by Veronica Henry Read Free Book Online

a Saturday afternoon it was a nightmare getting a place. She could be driving round for hours. She hit lucky in the next road, grabbed her handbag and got out of the car. She had to do this straight away, without thinking about it.
     
    She was about to put her key into the lock when the door opened. She stepped back in alarm when she looked up into the grim gaze of a policeman.
     
    ‘Mrs Briggs?’
     
    Her first thought was that Ed had done something terrible. Surely he wouldn’t be the type to kill himself? Yet he had dark moments, especially when he’d been drinking - she remembered now the smell of whisky when he came to bed, and the empty bottle in the recycling bin as she left the house. Where was he? Panicking, she went to rush in.
     
    ‘Ed . . . ?’
     
    The policeman put out a hand to stop her.
     
    ‘Mrs Briggs - I’m afraid your husband’s under arrest.’
     

     
    Twenty minutes later, Charlotte sat bolt upright on the sofa, her hands pressed in between her clenched knees, her teeth biting down on her bottom lip to stop her from crying.
     
    Ed had taken the ball money. He had taken all the profits raised from the tickets, the raffle, the auction, and the donations and bought a tranche of shares on a tip-off from a friend in the City. A small but dynamic software firm was about to be taken over by a larger company. It was a given that the shares would quadruple overnight. Obviously Ed’s plan had been to sell the shares on straight away, put the money back into the ball account ready to be handed over ceremoniously to the hospice, and keep the substantial difference.
     
    But by a million to one chance, the deal hadn’t come off. The dynamic managing director, the brains and therefore the intrinsic value of the company, had died in a helicopter crash on the way to signing the buy-out. Without him the company was worthless. The buy-out was pointless; the share prices crashed to zero. The money was wiped out. Ed was left with nothing.
     
    Or rather, the charity was left with nothing.
     
    It hadn’t taken long for his misdemeanour to be detected. He had forged the signature on the cheque in the hopes that the money would be back in the account before the other committee members noticed it was missing. But of course they were all clamouring to organise the presentation to the hospice, all relishing the prospect of a ceremony and a photo-shoot. Ed had had little choice but to put his hands up and turn himself in. It was either that or flee the country. No wonder he had been tense all week. He must have been waiting for the hammer to fall from the minute he had heard about the helicopter crash. And praying for some miracle. Praying that the original deal would be salvaged, though God knows how. And now, the police were preparing to take Ed down to the station for further questioning. They’d wondered at first if Charlotte was involved, but he’d made it clear she had nothing to do with it.
     
    He’d gone to fetch his jacket. He came back into the room looking dreadful, his skin pale, blue rings under his eyes.
     
    Charlotte looked at him, bewildered.
     
    ‘Why, Ed . . . ?’
     
    ‘I did it for us,’ he said in a choked voice. ‘I thought . . . if we could get out of London, get a house in the country, take the pressure off . . . I thought if you could stop work, then maybe . . . We didn’t have time to wait for me to be able to afford it. I was trying to speed things up.’
     
    Charlotte felt a surge of fury.
     
    ‘Is that was it was about?’ she demanded. ‘The bloody baby thing? You took that risk, took someone else’s money, just for another shot at it?’
     
    ‘I wanted things to be different! I thought maybe it was London stopping you . . . us . . .’
     
    ‘But I told you I couldn’t go through it again!’
     
    Ed looked distraught. ‘I can’t take no for an answer, Charlotte. I love you. I want us to have children. More than anything.’
     
    Charlotte felt tears spring