The Half Sister(102)

‘Don’t you dare!’ hisses Kate. ‘Don’t you dare try and justify your actions by blaming him. All he ever wanted to do was help people.’

Rose laughs bitterly. ‘Oh yes, he was very good at helping people, especially women whose husbands were beating them up. Your father liked to play the martyr and be on hand for his clients when they came out of hospital.’

‘Are you referring to my mother?’ asks Jess.

Kate had almost forgotten she was there.

Rose looks at Jess – her eyes silently saying yes.

‘So, you did know my mother?’ says Jess.

‘I knew of your mother,’ says Rose, correcting her.

‘Who are you lying for?’ asks Jess. ‘Your husband or yourself?’

‘Your father was going to leave us to be with Julia,’ says Rose, looking directly at Kate. ‘He wanted to be with her and the baby and there was nothing I could do to make him see sense.’

If it were possible for blood to freeze, Kate imagines this is what it would feel like. ‘He would never have left us!’ she shouts. ‘You know he wouldn’t!’

‘This is why I didn’t want to tell you anything,’ cries Rose. ‘I didn’t want to hurt you. I was only ever trying to protect you from knowing what your father was really like. But the reality was that he and Julia were going to make a new life together in London, with the baby.’ She throws Jess a disdainful look.

‘So what happened?’ presses Jess, when it looks like Rose has offered all that she’s going to.

‘Th-that was it,’ stutters Rose. ‘Your mother was killed and I presumed it was by her husband who found out what she was planning to do.’

Kate looks at her mother paralysed with fear on the floor. She can’t tell whether it’s because Jess is holding her grandson hostage, or she knows she’s sitting on a ticking timebomb.

‘The police are going to be crawling all over this now,’ says Jess. ‘And I’ll make sure that they don’t rest until they find out who killed my mother. So if there’s anything you’re not telling me . . .’ Jess raises the knife, her eyes never leaving Rose.

‘Okay, okay!’ calls out Rose, closing her eyes and shaking her head, as if trying to dislodge a deeply buried memory. ‘Harry packed his bags and said he was leaving – I pleaded with him not to go, but his mind was made up. When he got to Julia’s, she said she couldn’t do it – that her husband had found out and threatened to kill her and the baby if she went.’

Tears fall onto Rose’s cheek and Noah turns to look at his nana, momentarily forgetting the hostile situation he finds himself in. ‘What’s wrong, Nana?’ he asks, innocently, dabbing at her cheek with the sleeve of his top.

‘Please Jess, let me take him,’ says Lauren, falling onto her knees. ‘None of this is the children’s fault.’

‘Go on!’ barks Jess, ignoring her.

‘They rowed,’ says Rose, ‘and there was a scuffle. Harry said that she lost her footing and fell, hitting her head as she went down.’

A stunned silence descends on the room.

‘How could you!’ cries Kate. ‘How could you make up such wicked lies?’ It feels as if there’s an obstruction in her airways. She closes her eyes and forces herself to breathe in for three, and out for three.

Rose’s chest heaves as she sobs. ‘I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, but it was an accident – he never meant for it to happen.’

‘So why didn’t he just call the police?’ asks Jess, almost robotically. ‘If it was an accident.’

‘How could he?’ cries Rose. ‘He was a highly regarded lawyer. Imagine the investigation that would have had to be done. He could have lost everything: his job, his family and, if they didn’t believe him, his liberty.’

‘They’d know if it was accidental,’ says Jess. ‘An accident is an accident, but murder is murder.’

‘It was an accident,’ says Rose. ‘A terrible accident.’

‘And you’re prepared to take your husband at his word, are you?’ asks Jess. ‘The man who cheated on you, fathered a child, was going to live with someone else . . . you’re willing to believe his version of events?’

Rose nods. ‘Yes.’

‘Well I guess it’ll be down to the forensics now,’ says Jess, visibly relaxing, but not quite enough for Kate to feel confident to make a grab for Jude. ‘They’ll prove what really happened.’

‘I know what really happened,’ says Rose.

‘They won’t go on the hearsay of a scorned wife,’ says Jess, acerbically. ‘No matter how much she wants to believe it.’

‘I know what really happened . . .’ Rose says again, ‘. . . because I was there.’





50


One year later


‘How’s it going?’ Kate asks, as she sits down next to Lauren on the bench in Court One.

‘I didn’t think you’d come,’ says Lauren, leaning in for a kiss.

‘I had to force myself. I don’t know how I’m going to look her in the eye.’

‘It’s been a long time,’ says Lauren, rubbing her younger sister’s arm. ‘But she’ll be pleased to see you’re here.’