not lying, Tom. Not this time.’ Delighting in his distress, she pressed home her own version of the truth. ‘I’ve no idea who his father is, but I do know it’s not you, because it happened a short time before you and I lay down together. I tricked you, and like the gullible fool that you are, you never suspected; not even when I lied about him being born early. He’s an unwanted little bastard … made down a dark alley with some stranger who had more money than he knew what to do with.’
Stricken to the heart, Tom took her by the shoulders. ‘You’re a wicked, destructive woman, and your lies won’t get Casey back.’ He gripped her so tight she winced with pain. ‘He’s my son. Mine! D’you hear what I’m telling you? Casey is mine and he always will be. Nothing you say or do will ever change that.’
‘Oh, but you’re wrong. You’re not listening, Tom! It isn’t your blood that runs through the boy. It’s the blood of a stranger who never knew what he’d made, and probably couldn’t care less anyway. When the pleasure was over, he went his way and I went mine.’
Her words were like a knife through Tom’s heart. In his mind he went back to the day she told him she was pregnant. Had he really been so gullible?
Now the truth was out after all these years, it was as if a dam had broken in Ruth and the words poured out. ‘Do you remember all that time you were after me, and I turned you away; but then you finally came in useful … if you see what I mean?’ She gave a sly little grin. ‘When I found I were up the duff, I moved Heaven and Earth to be rid of it, but for some reason it wouldn’t be budged, more’s the pity. But there you were, all doe-eyed and in love. I never had any real feelings for you in that way. You were simply a way out of my dilemma. When I told you we were having a baby, oh, you were over the moon. So excited, planning this and that …’ she laughed out loud, ‘… and you never knew that your joy had been another man’s pleasure before we were ever married.’
While Tom took all this in, she watched his agony and felt nothing. ‘The thing is, I’ve done you a favour. You won’t want to be saddled with him now, will yer, eh? Not now you know the truth. He’s not so special after all. Think about it, Tom. For all we know, his real father might have been a dodgy sort with a badness that could rise in the boy at any time. Then there’s the matter of my own blood running through his veins … the blood of a woman you believe to be wicked. Maybe the boy’s a chip off the old block. What if his real father turns out to be some sort of villain, a wanted killer, even?’ The thought amused her. ‘What about that, eh?’
‘Never!’ Though reeling from what she’d told him, Tom ferociously defended the child’s good nature. ‘Casey is nothing like you! He’s good and fine. I’ve raised him to know the right way to live. I’m proud of his every achievement, and I’ve always encouraged him into doing what he loves and what he’s good at. That’s what a father does, and that’s what I am: Casey’s father. I held him when he was born and I’ve nurtured him ever since. I love him and he loves me, and there’s a powerful father-and-son bond between us. No man alive could be prouder of his son than I am of Casey … my son.’
The more distressed he became, the more Ruth revelled in it. ‘Tell him!’ she urged. ‘Go out there and tell him he’s not your son. Then we’ll see who he’ll want to stay with. Tell him he can be with you – someone who had no part in creating him – or he can stay here where he belongs, with his blood mother, the woman who carried him inside her for nine months; the woman who gave birth to him, and raised him, and made sure he had a roof over his head. Tell him how I was made to use my wiles and make sacrifices, to be with a man I didn’t love, so he would always be provided for.’
When he made no move, she rounded on him. ‘Go on! Tell him the truth! Because if you don’t, I will!’ She would much rather Tom told the boy, because then Tom would be outcast instead of her.
But Tom was determined. ‘Casey is my son and I’m his father, and if you tell him anything other, I swear I’ll kill you!’
Seeing him like this, so cold and unforgiving, she took an involuntary step back. ‘Big words for such a little man.’
Tom wisely ignored her remark. ‘I mean it. That boy has gone through enough already, without you telling him he was spawned in some dark alley by his tart of a mother and some stranger who’s long gone.’
‘Sorry, Tom, but the boy has a right to know. So, like I say, if you don’t tell him, I surely will.’
In that moment Tom actually entertained the idea of putting his two hands round her neck and strangling the life out of her. By God, he was sorely tempted.
‘Alongside my own father, Casey is the only good thing in my life,’ he told her. ‘I need to know he’s safe and secure.’
Thrusting her aside, he started down the passage, Ruth right behind him, ranting and raving, telling him how he could not stop her from getting to the boy.
‘If not today, then tomorrow. Either way, you’ve lost him, Tom. But then, he was never yours anyway.’
When Tom tried to get out of the door, she leaped forward to catch him unawares. Grabbing his hair, she caught him off balance and fought him down. But Tom was the stronger. Having swiftly wrestled her to the carpet, he made a dash for the door.
When she clambered up, intent on forcing him back, he instinctively hit out and sent her sprawling. Before she could get up, he was away down the street, the only thought in his mind to find Casey.
Spread-eagled on the floor, Ruth made no effort to get up. ‘You won’t have him for long!’ she shouted after him. ‘When I tell your dad the truth, he won’t even want the little bastard in his house!’
Tom ran down the street, leaving her yelling obscenities. ‘You’ve not heard the last o’ me! I’ll get him back, even if I have to fight you in court.’
Deliberately closing his ears to her screeching, he grew increasingly anxious that Casey might have overheard what she’d said earlier, and her vile threats played on his mind. She’s lying! he tried to convince himself. Casey is my son. She would say anything to suit her own ends; even labelling her own child a bastard. But she won’t get her claws into him, not if I have anything to do with it.
But he knew that keeping her at bay would not be easy and because of his own unfortunate predicament, might even be beyond his control.
‘Dear Lord, what am I to do?’ Slowing his steps, Tom glanced up at the shifting skies and, for the strangest moment, he felt a great sense of peace. The kind of peace that warmed and reassured; easing the restless soul.
But then he thought of the jeopardy Casey was in, and his peace was short-lived.
As he went down the street, calling out for Casey, the next-door neighbours were at the front door looking out. Sylvia Marshall and her husband, William, had lived next to the Denton family these past nine years. Having soon learned that she was trouble, they had given Ruth a wide berth, but they always had a smile for Tom and his son, Casey.
‘I’m worried.’ William was anxious. ‘Something went a hell of a bang. I’m wondering if somebody might be hurt.’
‘Well, thank goodness it’s not Tom or the boy, because we’ve just seen them go off down the street … poor little devil, having to put up with a mother like that! And if Tom’s given that wife of his a good slapping,
