in his voice.
“Well, no, because —” I lost my train of thought. Money was my Achilles heel. Money was the spark that had lit the fuse for my fight with my sister.
I’d always had to struggle to be financially independent. Any money my parents gave me was always a loan. Whereas Scarlet only had to click her fingers and loot would be forthcoming, no strings, which was why it was so disturbing that she’d gone to Fliss for cash and not our parents. Unable to come clean and speak about my own resentments, I didn’t finish.
“If we breathe a word it will be like trashing her memory.” Nate’s tone was a lot more dialled down. He briefly touched my arm in what was meant as a shared moment of understanding and complicity.
Grubby little fingers closed around my throat and gave it a good squeeze. Silence lengthened in the car. Now came the hard part. “I promise to keep your affair, fling, whatever, safe on one condition.”
He looked incredulous and grateful.
“You’re a gutless bastard, Nate, and the only reason you’re making a big deal about Scarlet’s affair is because you can’t stand the heat and attention on your own.”
“That’s not —”
“Save it. I’m only doing this to protect Mum and Dad. If you have a shred of decency, as soon as the funeral is out of the way, you’ll break your business partnership with Dad and clear off out of our lives.”
Despite Nate’s protestation, I told Nate that he had a duty to drop in and see Mum and Dad before we went to mine. It’s what they’d expect, and it would be unkind not to. We didn’t speak for the rest of the journey. Noise from the car’s squeaky brakes, the result of an extended period of hot, dry weather, bored through the silence. Gave me time to turn things over in my head. Murder and money, those incestuously connected twins. How the shooting of a man fitted into things I’d no idea, but it slotted in somehow.
The nearer we got to Malvern, the more the hills laid claim to the town. I’d always thought of them as quintessentially British. Today, they seemed like foreign invaders.
Pulling up outside Mum and Dad’s, Nate grasped the thorny silence prickling between us. “Promise you won’t say anything to your folks?”
I slammed on the handbrake. “It’s bit late for that, isn’t it?” He briefly closed his eyes, covered his mouth with his hand. He was sweating. A lot.
“You do realise that Dad could win super-sleuth of the year?” Which was a problem. If he found out half of what I knew so would Mum and it would kill her.
Nate issued a gale of a sigh in response. “He hasn’t worked for the police for years.”
As if this made a difference. “He still has connections. You want my advice?”
“Go on,” he said, shrinking, as if trying to bury himself in the foot well.
“Be as honest as you can without destroying them.”
Nate pitched forward, scrubbed at his face then his hair, and mumbled something indecipherable.
“And don’t forget what I told you about the partnership,” I added.
At the sound of the car doors opening and closing, Mr Lee went crazy and didn’t quieten until we were inside. I bent down and was overwhelmed with a blast of slobbery doggy breath.
Dad appeared, visibly harassed. “Bloody newspaper hacks. Phone hasn’t stopped. Nate,” he said, softening, arms extended, pulling my brother-in-law close. Always tactile, it was one of the things I loved about my father. “How are you holding up, son?”
Nate glanced across, caught my eye, anxiety scribbled all over his face. “Okay, I guess.”
Dad patted Nate on the back and pulled away. “Any updates from the police? Only my source appears to have dried up. Can’t seem to get a word out of anyone.”
I made a big play of stroking our dog. Close to Nate, I could feel the friction coming off him in waves. Tense and perplexed, my dad looked from me to Nate. “Well, erm— my family liaison officer, a guy called Childe,” Nate began in a strangled voice, “he visited this morning, confirming the results of the post-mortem.”
Dad flicked an uneasy, expectant look.
I studied the floor as Nate revealed the toxicology results.
“Drunk?” Dad said, astounded.
“The vehicle examiner’s report corroborated witness statements. They seem to think that Scarlet was unstable.”
I could see Dad hanging on Nate’s every word. His cheeks sagged in dismay. “I don’t understand.” I caught the distraction in his voice. For once, my father’s sharp mind was slow to catch on.
“They believe she intended to commit suicide,” Nate said in a low tone.
It was as if we’d all tumbled into a void. Pain that was almost physical accelerated through me. It was some time before my father recovered the power of speech.
“How could we have missed the signs?” He pressed a hand to his temple, as if trying to put pressure on the thinking part of his brain. “I don’t get it,” he said, shaking his head. “I have to ask you, son. Did Scarlet leave a note?”
Nate swallowed. His hands clenched tight, knuckles virtually bursting through his skin. I tried to catch his eye again, but he refused to make contact.
Dad viewed me in a way that told me he’d twigged he wasn’t getting the full story. “Let’s go into the study, Nate.”
Ignoring Nate’s cornered expression, I said, “Where’s Mum?”
“In the sitting room. Had a few drinks.” Code for she’s drunk, which was hardly surprising if not exactly helpful.
“I’ll keep her company,” I said, as Dad turned on his heel, Nate gloomy, loping along behind him.
Dressed in an old tracksuit, Mum sat on the floor surrounded by boxes of old photographs. Engrossed, she didn’t look up. Against the shuttered light, the smell of booze hung heavy. I slid onto the floor beside her.
“Remember this?” She glanced up, her face, without make-up, puffy with crying. She showed me Scarlet’s graduation photograph. Goofing around, her mortarboard askew, you could see the happiness radiating out of her. The only person bursting with more pride than Scarlet on that day had been Mum. She touched the print tenderly, tracing the line around my sister’s face, dropping a kiss onto it before planting it carefully next to a line of others. Method in her madness, the photographs were arranged in date order, from babyhood to childhood, adolescent and young adult. Millions of them, more even than Zach, her firstborn.
I wrapped an arm around her shoulders, giving her a squeeze. In the space of forty-eight hours, she’d lost weight, felt as fragile as spun glass. “And this,” I smiled, picking out a photo of Scarlet and me on holiday in Cornwall. The
