She went to the previous event on the history list. Jenny arriving home on her own, rushing up the stairs and looking brighter, the time stamp saying it was only two minutes earlier: 7.16pm.
What had happened in those two minutes?
Emme went back further, and dropped her phone on the bed in shock.
No.
She picked her phone back up, her hand shaking. The previous event. Time stamp: 6.49pm. Lexy Harrington and Tristan Du Kok on the threshold of the family home. Kissing passionately, before he turned her around and pressed into her from behind as he pinned her against the door and threaded his fingers through hers. Lexy’s sparkling ruby ring and wicked smile, fully facing the camera as she bit her lip.
Bastards.
It was there all along. No wonder Lexy was raging with jealousy. No wonder Lexy had seemed so especially jumpy when Emme first arrived in town. Video evidence was sitting on their devices like a time bomb and Bill was too stupid and too disinterested to notice. Was that why she relaxed a little at the end of November, after the thirty days had expired? Was that why she was so pissed off when Bella accidentally upgraded the BUZZ app to ninety days? Her tryst with Tristan wouldn’t be so easy to cover up. That was why she turned psycho after she saw Tristan and Emme together at the Kivvi Christingle.
Was Tristan fucking both Jenny and Lexy? The guy got more and more depraved.
Emme went back one more event, 5.43pm, Jenny and the kids leaving the apartment, the children in their costumes. Jenny looking happy and nurturing as she closed the door and held Bella’s hand.
Emme felt sick to the core. Her palms had gone in on themselves, she was gripping her phone so intensely. She looked across the room at her coat strewn on the chair and got up off the bed, her legs so heavy it was as thoughweights were tied to them. She had to find out how long Tristan and Jenny had been dating. She had to find out what happened on Halloween night, and thought of the one person who might have the answers.
As Emme threw on her boots she felt nauseous at the realisation that while Tom and Chrissy were having their first dance to ‘Where the Wild Roses Grow’, Tristan Du Kok was fucking Lexy in the Harrington home.
Chapter Seventy-Two
Bill walked down the corridor to look in on the kids and gently pulled their doors to. When he came back to the living room, Lexy was sitting on the sofa, her spine curled over, her shoulders hunched, her hands over her mouth, almost in disbelief.
He plucked a bottle of red from the wine cabinet and took two glasses out of the cupboard and poured them each a drink, then sat close to his wife, whose gaze was firmly facing forward, in the middle of the room.
‘What the hell makes you think this?’
‘I caught her red handed, pouringimmensequantities of pink Himalayan salt into two glasses of lemonade as I came home. And it’s not the first time…’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Remember Harry was sick last week, the night of our anniversary?’
Bill nodded.
‘She’d fed him frozen bratwurst!’
Lexy was on a roll now.
‘Are you sure?’ quizzed Bill.
‘I saw it in the bin!’ She took a sharp breath. ‘And Bella at the Kivvi Christingle. Emme was plying her with a solution as she went on her rounds. Bella wassickthat night!’
Bill sounded unconvinced.
‘But why would Emme want to do that?’
Lexy looked at him theatrically. Her eyes stung.
‘Attention. It’s why anyone does it.’
Bill pushed his wine away.
‘Really, Bill. I saw her with my own eyes, tipping half a bloody container of salt into their drinks while she prepared dinner. I feel sick.’ She put her fist to her mouth.
‘Jesus, Lex, what is it with us and nannies?’ Bill said, shaking his head. ‘First Jenny steals from us, now Emme tries to poison the kids!’
