‘Oh?’
‘Look, it’s not my story to tell…’
‘But you’re going to tell me anyway?’
George hesitated again. ‘Mina is Ruby’s mother.’
‘Hermother?’ Well, I wasn’t expecting that.
‘I was just as shocked as you when she told me.’
‘Do you mean a sort of stepmother? I think poor Ruby’s had several of those. The woman with the daft Pomeranians was one.’
‘No, actually her biological mother.’ George stood to make more coffee. ‘Hell, I could do with a proper drink.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘Sun’s over the yardarm. Have you anything, or shall I go to the Co-op?’
‘I’ve a bottle of limoncello,’ I said. ‘About it, I think.’
‘Why not?’ George grinned tiredly, pulling a hand through the beginning of – rather attractive – stubble.
I stood and reached into the cupboard for both the bottle of liqueur Mum had brought back from somewhere years ago and a couple of glasses.
‘OK, so here’s the story according to Mina…’ George began, after taking a sip of the drink. He pulled a face, probably at the contents of the glass as well as what he was telling me. ‘And knowing Mina, I would estimate only half of what she tells is the truth. Anyway, Mina’s much older sister, April Ballantyne – another model – was married to Darren Singleton and living in London. From what Mina told me, Singleton worshipped April. Mina was struggling to follow in April’s modelling shoes, but April, now in her thirties and fed up with all the modelling and everything that went with it, just wanted to get out and settle down. What she didn’t tell Singleton was that she couldn’t have children. Whether that would have put him off marrying her, who knows.’
‘How did she know? That she couldn’t have children, I mean?’
‘Born without a womb apparently.’
‘Oh, come on!’ I gave a little laugh. ‘That really is a made-up tale…’
‘What I thought. But Mina knows all the facts about MRKH.’
‘MRKH?’
‘Hang on, what is it?’ George took out his phone. ‘I googled it when she told me. Here we are: Mayer-Rokitansky-Küster-Hauser Syndrome. Apparently, April discovered she had no womb when, at sixteen, she still hadn’t begun to menstruate. Their mother assumed it was because she was always dieting in order to be thin enough to be a model. You know, living on champagne and cigs? An investigation showed she had this MRKH. Mina was only a little girl at the time, but April told her later that, at sixteen, she wasn’t overly bothered – having kids was the last thing on her mind.’
I nodded. ‘At sixteen, you do tend to live very much in the present.’
‘Anyway, Mina, struggling to make it big like her sister had – I reckon she was sliding into the porn film world, but she’s always denied it – ends up pregnant at nineteen. April, seeing an opportunity, now confesses to Singleton that she can never have children. So, they give Mina lots of money to keep quiet, adopt the baby and send Mina on her way. Mina, in turn, makes it big, poor April dies of breast cancer not long after Ruby is born and Singleton is left, literally holding the baby.’
‘You couldn’t make it up!’ I stared at George.
‘Knowing Mina, she has the capacity to do just that.’
‘Ruby told Lola her mother died at birth. That’s what she’s been told anyway.’
‘Tangled webs,’ George said.
‘So, OK, why is Mina back on the scene? Down at Queen’s Gardens? Does she want to claim Ruby as her own?’
‘I doubt it very much! Mina’s never wanted children. It came as a total shock to me when she told me all this. Mina’s career has taken a total nosedive over the past couple of years and, now I’ve severed our relationship, she’s running scared. I’m pretty sure it’s money she’s after from Singleton. She’ll be out for what she can get. Once she’d got wind that he and Ruby had left London and moved north, and were actually living here in Beddingfield, she’d have been right in there, trying to get whatever she can from him.’
‘Why on earth did you stay with Mina all these years?’ I asked.
‘Why did your mum stay with Jayden Allen? Why did you stay with Dean, Jess?’
‘OK, OK.’ I put up two hands. ‘I get it. So, what happens now? Will Mina take Ruby on? Poor kid, poor, poor kid. What chance did she ever have with a drug pusher for a dad and a mother who didn’t want her? As well as all the stepmothers in between? Oh.’ I suddenly thought. ‘What about Kateryna?’
‘Kateryna?’
