The Last Party (DC Morgan #1)(112)

‘Are you—’ Glynis chokes back a sob. ‘Are you sure?’

Clemmie leans over Rhys, shielding Glynis from the terrible sight of her son, lying motionless on the floor. ‘Quite sure.’ She feels once more for a pulse, willing things to be different, but nothing has changed. Nausea rises in her throat, but Clemmie thinks of the freedom she can have, now she doesn’t have to pay Rhys back. Everything happens for a reason, she tells herself.

‘I’m afraid you’ve killed him,’ she tells Glynis.

As Glynis collapses into a chair, sobbing, Clemmie remains motionless, her fingers on Rhys’s pulse. Slow and weak, but unmistakably present.

For now.





FIFTY-EIGHT




JANUARY 9TH | FFION


Before a decision can be made to release Angharad, Ffion and Leo have to check out her alibi, and Ffion’s mam is delighted to finally be allowed to stick her nose in. She confirms that she did indeed spend New Year’s Eve with Angharad. ‘Now, will you stop for a paned?’

‘Mam, we’re in the middle of a murder investigation. Leo’s waiting outside.’

‘I’ll give you some space,’ he’d said, when they arrived at the Morgans’ house, and Ffion had been grateful for his understanding.

‘I wish you’d mentioned you were with Angharad,’ she says to Elen now. ‘We might not have nicked her.’

‘You refused to discuss the case.’

‘Mam, that’s diff—’

‘I believe your words were: “especially not to my mother”. Because presumably I’m going to shoot my mouth off around the village, am I? Never mind that I’ve got more on half of them than you’ll ever know.’

‘I’m not interested in tittle-tattle, Mam.’

‘It’s not tittle-tattle if Jos Carter’s run off with his driving instructor, is it?’

Ffion rolls her eyes. ‘I mean, Mam, it literally is—’

‘Or if Glynis Lloyd is disputing Jac’s will?’

‘What?’

‘She’s found his original will, leaving T?’r Lan to her. She’s going to take legal action.’

‘Oh, my God, Mam, I don’t care!’ Ffion should know better than to get sucked into Mam’s gossip. She glances upstairs. ‘How’s Seren?’

‘Sleeping.’

The hospital had discharged Seren after the morning rounds and, once they were home, Mam packed her off to bed with a hot water bottle and a mug of tomato soup. The consultant confirmed there’d been no ill-effects from her terrifying ordeal, but they all know how lucky she was.

‘She hasn’t answered my texts.’

When the ambulance had reached the boathouse, Ffion had gone with Seren to hospital, Leo following in the car. Ffion had squeezed Seren’s cold hand and prayed she would be okay. Seren was so angry with her, but Ffion had saved her life – that would count for something, surely? But the moment Seren came round, she pushed Ffion away, making such a commotion that the nurses came to see what was happening. ‘Get away from me!’

Ffion’s texted her all morning, in between briefings and interviewing Angharad, but even though every message has been marked as read, there’s been no reply.

‘Give her time,’ Elen says.

‘She hates me.’

‘All daughters hate their mothers at some stage. It’s a rite of passage.’

Ffion opens her mouth to disagree, then catches Mam’s eye and gives a wry smile. They stand in silence for a while, each lost in their own thoughts, and then Elen gently touches Ffion’s arm, her face darkening.

‘Rhys, then.’

Whatever Seren has told Mam can only be half of the truth, and now she waits for Ffion to tell the rest of the story. For sixteen years Elen has raised Ffion’s daughter as her own. She encouraged Ffion to leave Cwm Coed, to find her own way in life, unhindered by a baby. Ffion knows Mam deserves the truth, but all she can say is, ‘I didn’t want it, Mam. I didn’t want him,’ before she’s sobbing again.

Elen’s own face crumples in pain and she holds Ffion so tight she can hardly breathe.

‘I’m so sorry, Ffi, so sorry for everything that’s happened.’

Back in the car, Ffion calls the incident room to confirm Angharad can be released. If Leo notices her red eyes, he doesn’t mention it. There is a comfort, she realises, in being with someone who knows everything about you.

There were several times over the course of her relationship with Huw when she wanted to tell him the truth. Not about Seren – she’d sworn blind never to breathe a word about that – but about the rape.

Rape.

It’s the first time she’s used the word, even to herself, and yet it’s the only word for it. Rhys raped her.

Ffion had dealt with a job at work once: a girl in her twenties who’d had too much to drink and woken up with no memory of what her body told her had happened. Ffion had driven home on autopilot, then walked through the front door and fallen apart. Huw poured her a glass of wine and said all the right things. That Ffion was amazing to do the job she did; that the stress was bound to come out from time to time. And Ffion took a breath and thought, Now. I’ll tell him now.

‘Silly girl, getting so plastered,’ Huw said then. ‘You see it all the time, don’t you? They get the beer goggles on, then the next day they regret it.’