Broken Silence (Silence, #2)(27)

Mum pulled me away from Cole and into one of those hugs that made me feel like a little girl again. She held me tight and stroked my hair. She used to hug me like that if I’d had a bad dream or hurt myself. It made me feel safe and like nothing bad could happen to me. I stopped feeling completely safe like that from the age of five.

The night she found out she held me, and for the first time in eleven years I believed that eventually it would be okay. That night I felt like I got my mum back.

“Y-You can if you want. I understand if you do.”

This trip was about Mum and Jasper getting closure too, not just me.

“No, Oakley. The only time I want to lay eyes on him again is when he’s being carried away to rot in prison.”

I flinched at how much hate was in her voice.

“Okay,” I whispered.

“What’s going on?” Jasper’s demanded, thudding down the stairs, hair dripping.

“Max wants to see Sarah,” Cole explained, making Max sound like a dirty word.

I watched Jasper’s eyes tense and his jaw clench.

“What?” he growled, disbelievingly. His face turned red with anger.

Mum held her hand up.

“I’m not going, Jasper. Of course I’m not.”

“Good! Why can’t that sick bastard just fucking leave us alone?” Jasper paced the room, shaking his head. “What the hell does he want anyway?”

“I doesn’t matter. She’s not going,” Cole said, trying to calm Jasper’s temper.

“It does matter,” he countered. “What the hell is going through his sick mind? Does he think Mum would actually want to see him? What was he going to say to her, oh sorry for selling our daughter—”

I cringed and squeezed my eyes closed as if that would prevent me from hearing what Jasper was about to say.

“That’s enough, Jasper,” Mum snapped.

Don’t cry, don’t cry. I didn’t want to keep crying all the time. I wanted to be stronger than that.

Jasper groaned “Shit. I’m sorry, Oakley.”

“It’s fine.”

He looked like he wanted to say something else, but I wasn’t up for talking about it. I would speak to Mum once Jasper wasn’t around. He would get too angry.

“I’m tired. I’m going to bed.”

Cole looked at me sceptically. He knew that I just wanted to get away. I was tired though. It had been a very long day.

“Call me if you need to talk,” Cole whispered in my ear and hugged me tight.

As soon as Cole left, I went to Lizzie’s room. She was staying at ‘someone’s’ house tonight, so I had the room to myself. I had a feeling Ali made her stay at a friend’s, knowing that I would just want some time alone. I also had a feeling that this someone was Lizzie’s boyfriend.

I laid on the futon and stared up at the ceiling, waiting to fall asleep. Thousands of thoughts were swirling around my head making it impossible to drift off. The scariest one was what if they get off? I knew Linda said there was too much evidence, but it wasn’t impossible for a guilty man to be found innocent.

Would Dad have some believable excuse or elaborate story that the jury would believe? It wouldn’t surprise me at all if he did.

I eventually gave in to the fact that sleep was not going to come anytime soon and got up. It was one in the morning so Cole probably wouldn’t appreciate a call now.

I made my way downstairs and into the kitchen. Mum was sitting at the table drinking tea. I blinked to make sure I really had seen her.

“Mum?”

Her head snapped up to me. “Oh, hi, sweetheart. Everything okay?”

“Yeah, just couldn’t sleep. What about you?”

“Same.”

I chewed my lip and sat down opposite her. Drinking tea at one in the morning wasn’t a good sign.

“Can we talk, or are you going to bed?”

“No. Of course we can talk. I’ll make us a drink; this one’s cold now anyway.”

I watched Mum boil the kettle and get the mugs out. She was too calm. That meant something was bothering her. Dad.

“Are you okay, Mum?”

She nodded and busied herself making hot chocolate. I smiled as she sat back down, handing me a mug.

“What do you want to talk about?” she asked.

“Dad, and what happened earlier.”

She pursed her lips and nodded once. “I thought so.”

“I know you said you didn’t want to see him, but if you’re only doing that because of me then please don’t. You were married for a long time, so I understand if there are things you need to talk to him about. If you want answers or—”

“Oakley, I appreciate you thinking of me, but I hate that man. You won’t understand until you’re a mother yourself, but when someone hurts your child you want to kill them.”

I blinked in shock. I knew that Mum loved me, but I didn’t understand how deeply.

“I stopped loving him the second I found out what he’d done. If I had the opportunity I would pull the trigger on him myself.”

Mum had never said anything like that to me before. It made me want to cry. I finally realised how wrong Dad had been: Mum would never have abandoned me for speaking out. I wish I had known that years ago, but I was a kid, and I believed my dad.