Lying in Wait(82)

‘Oh God. I was right all along. He murdered her, but you are as much to blame.’

‘Me?’

‘I can’t believe you forced Dad into such an outrageous plan. No wonder he died so soon after. The stress of it all killed him.’

Tears welled up in my eyes. I needed Laurence to understand.

‘I miss him every day. That girl, she was so evil. She tried to stab him! She pushed him to the limit.’

‘You pushed him to the limit. And yet you’ve been able to carry on as if nothing has happened, just like after Diana … drowned.’

‘Life throws hurdles at us, darling. We must get over them.’

‘Annie was a hurdle? Diana was a hurdle?’ Laurence’s voice was breaking.

‘Please don’t be dramatic about this. What is done is done, and we are both implicated.’

I could feel his anger. ‘You involved me. You knew what had happened, and you involved me. I poured cement over her grave!’

‘Yes, but we have to just forget about it all now, get back to normal.’

‘You have no idea what normal is.’

‘I’ll do anything you want, I can change.’

‘You can’t.’

‘But I will –’

‘Mum, I am never, ever coming back to live with you. Ever.’

‘I see.’

I was perfectly calm, set a smile on my face.

‘I can’t live in a graveyard.’

I used the only thing I had. ‘Darling, I can make you slim again – look how you have ballooned since you left this house.’

I knew that I had thrown him with this statement. He sighed heavily and pinched the top of his nose between his thumb and forefinger.

‘What are you talking about?’

‘I had you on phentermine. It’s a drug prescribed for lethargy and depression, but the side effect is weight loss.’ I explained how I’d got the drug, how I had crushed it into his meals. I went to the kitchen and took the bottle of tablets out from behind the vanilla essence and showed him. ‘Here, you can keep them. They work really well. I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want you to feel self-conscious about it. I wanted you to think you’d lost the weight by yourself.’

Laurence began to cry, and I took him in my arms and placed the tablet bottle in his pocket, but he aggressively shook me off and stood in the opposite corner of the room.

‘This is so screwed up. I can’t believe it.’

‘Everything I do is for you, darling.’

‘Please, just stop.’

I stopped then because everything I said seemed to make things worse. He threw open the window and inhaled deeply. Freezing December air stole into the room. The silence between us grew in length, and the atmosphere plummeted with the temperature. When he turned back to face me, his tears had dried and he pushed his thumb under his chin the way Andrew used to when he was going to make an announcement. He spoke without emotion.

‘For now, I will support you financially as far as I am able. Once a month, I will come for dinner.’

My heart lifted. It was something. I could work on him to make it once a week.

‘But there is one condition. I have a girlfriend. You must accept her, she will come with me. I’m only here now because she forced me to come.’

‘Oh, but, Laurence, can’t it be just us? You are my only relative. She would feel like an intruder.’

‘Mum, I will not be living here, and she will only feel like an intruder if you make her feel like one. And … there’s something I have to tell you about her.’

His forehead glistened with sweat, and I wondered what could possibly make him so nervous.

‘She is Annie Doyle’s sister. It’s Karen. Karen Doyle is my girlfriend.’

I was utterly stunned.

‘The prostitute’s sister?’

‘I think you should refer to Annie as the murder victim. Karen is not a thief or an addict or a prostitute. She is sweet and kind and generous, and really beautiful. If you gave her a chance, you would really like her. She is modelling at the moment, but she’s going to study art, and she is quite well travelled. You might even have seen her in magazines …’

He babbled on and his eyes shone as he spoke of her, but I tried not to listen because my head began to pound, although it didn’t stop me from hearing him say, ‘I love her, Mum.’

The treacherous bastard.

Somehow I kept it together and managed not to show signs of the electrical storm fizzing in my head. Laurence asked if he could bring the girl to dinner. I smiled and nodded.

‘Are you sure?’ he said. ‘Do you need more time to get used to the idea? Of course, she doesn’t know anything about what happened to Annie. We won’t even mention Annie. I think she might be uncomfortable if she knew … that you knew about her sister. Are you really sure it will be OK?’

‘I’m sure, darling.’

He looked at me with uncertainty. ‘I think I’m glad I know the truth now. About Dad and Annie. I think I can understand why he did what he did, but it really is unforgivable. And, Mum, I really think you need to get help, psychiatric help. Obviously, you can’t tell Malcolm about Annie, but you should see somebody, professionally. I think you have invested too much of your life in me, and you need to let go now.’