She was trying to block out what Dave had told her but using the job as a way to escape, as she so often would, was hard because he was a part of that. Izzy had allowed Jessica to swap cars with her for the evening without asking any questions other than ‘You’re not going to do something stupid, are you?’
Jessica tuned in the radio to the local stations, waiting to hear if anything was going to spiral out of the incident in the city centre. Although the news had mentioned a police presence, there was nothing more.
She realised she could be in for a long night sitting in a car if Adam genuinely was working late but she parked in between street lights on the road that ran adjacent to the university’s staff car park. With the lamps placed handily around the area, Jessica could see exactly where Adam had parked and there was little chance of him spotting her, even if he did somehow know to look for Izzy’s car.
A steady stream of students began to pass Jessica’s vehicle as the clock on her phone eased around to the time she knew Adam usually finished. She watched the groups passing, thinking they seemed to be getting ever younger, before realising she was one step away from complaining about ‘kids today’.
Jessica turned her attention to the door at the side of the building, wanting to believe Adam really was staying late and wouldn’t emerge. At five minutes past the time he was due to finish, she was feeling a little ashamed of herself for doubting him. By fifteen minutes past, she had put the key back in the ignition and was ready to pull away, before the voice at the back of her head told her to wait five more minutes.
As Adam emerged from the building with his bag over his shoulder a couple of minutes later, Jessica felt a sinking feeling in her stomach, a sense that something was about to go horribly wrong but that she was simply a bystander, unable or unwilling to step in. Jessica noticed he had on different clothes than he had been in that morning. He always wore similar things to work, dark trousers with a shirt, over which he would wear a lab coat. He was now wearing a pair of smart jeans with a casual shirt he usually only wore on a night out, along with his best jacket.
After he got into the car, Jessica watched him talking into his mobile phone, smiling and laughing. She tried to think of an innocent explanation of who it might be. Although he didn’t have any family, that didn’t mean he might not be meeting up with someone he used to know from school, or someone he went to university with, or perhaps even a work colleague.
None of that would explain why he had told her he was working late though.
He hung up and switched on the headlights. Jessica turned the key of Izzy’s car, feeling the power roar through it. She slid down into her seat as Adam drove past, waiting a few moments before slipping into the traffic behind him.
Although rush hour was over, there were still plenty of people trying to get home or to whatever theatre or concert was on that night. Or just driving around in circles specifically to annoy her. Jessica had never really done much in the way of vehicle surveillance, and now relied instead on what she had seen on television shows by staying two car lengths behind. She followed Adam along Oxford Road onto Deansgate, with no idea where he was heading as he kept driving north. The traffic was stop–start until they reached the outskirts, with all the signs pointing towards either Prestwich or the motorway ring road.
Just as she thought he was going to join the M60, Adam indicated, turning left off the main road. Jessica was so surprised, she almost missed the turn herself, swerving late as the person in the car behind beeped their horn.
It took her a few moments to realise where she had turned into. The road branched off into two, the left lane leading to a Tesco, the right twisting around on itself before ending up in a car park for a restaurant and hotel. She hoped Adam would turn left into the supermarket, as if he had somehow come this far out of his way to pick up some groceries. Instead, he stayed on the road that led to the hotel.
Jessica eased off the accelerator and stopped, checking her rear-view mirror to see with a small amount of relief that no one was behind her. She crept the vehicle forward, watching as Adam drove his car front-first into a space opposite the entrance of the restaurant. It was an American-style one with a black-and-red awning hanging over the door and branding everywhere, just in case you walked in the front door and forgot where you were. Jessica waited as Adam switched off the headlights. In the moment of darkness, she pressed the accelerator, powering around the corner past where Adam had stopped into the middle part of the car park, where she reversed into a space.
As she peered up, Jessica saw Adam hurrying across the tarmac into the restaurant. There were around a dozen seats at the front of the diner and perhaps half-a-dozen slightly further back. She picked up her phone, wondering whether she should call him, when a blonde woman stepped out of the car she had parked next to. As she had reversed, Jessica hadn’t even noticed her but the woman was holding her phone in one hand and a bag in the other. Her hair was bright and bleached, curled into a short bob, and she was wearing tight-fitting jeans with a matching jacket.
The woman tottered into the restaurant wearing heels Jessica wouldn’t have even attempted to try on and, for a minute or two, everything seemed to slow down. Jessica wondered if she would have to get out of the car and go in herself to see what was happening, or if there was a completely innocent explanation and that Adam had popped out for a bite to eat, with the woman nothing to do with him.
The car was beginning to steam up and Jessica balled her sleeve to wipe the window. She was halfway through clearing the windscreen when she felt her heart jump. A waiter was strolling along the front window with Adam and the blonde behind him. When they reached the table at the end, Adam and the female slid onto opposite sides, the server handing them menus and writing down what she presumed were drinks orders.
They were smiling and laughing. All of them.
Jessica swore at the condensation, before giving up and getting out of the car, leaning against the driver’s side door in the darkness and shivering as the breeze zipped across her. She folded her arms but it wasn’t the wind that was making her tremble. The blonde with the stupid curly bob reached across with her stupid tanned hand and touched Adam on his stupid arm.
Jessica could feel her throat tightening, the sickness that had been crippling her stomach so often recently ripping through the rest of her body. She pressed herself against the vehicle, using it to hold herself up. Somehow, she forced herself not to cry, fighting every instinct she had, trying to think of an innocent explanation for why he could be in a restaurant miles from their house with an attractive blonde after telling her he was working late.
Could it be because she was always working herself? Early mornings, late nights and everything in between? Perhaps it was because he was annoyed at her for not helping with the decision about where they should live? Maybe he was simply bored?
Perhaps it was because of what had happened in America?
Jessica bit her lip, remembering what he was like when they first met; always apologising, stammering over his words, clumsy, awkward, socially inexperienced. She watched him through the window laughing as the waiter passed them drinks and they raised their glasses in an unknown toast. Suddenly she was angry, furious that she had helped him become the person he now was and that he was using it against her, taking the confidence to chat up curly-haired blonde tarts.
She stared through the darkness as the lights from inside the restaurant illuminated the area in front of her. Even from a distance, when Jessica looked properly, she could see the woman was a bit older than her, which only made things worse. If Adam was going to dump her for some slutty student with a push-up bra, that was one thing, but it would be a humiliation too far if it was for someone born before her. Someone who spent half her life getting her hair dyed and curled instead of doing a proper job.