What the hell are you doing?Heidi asked herself as she returned from the counter with two cups of tea.This isn’t part of the plan!
‘I’m sorry,’ offered Josie and blew her nose into a tissue.
‘Have you had some bad news?’
Josie nodded and spoke quietly. ‘I received some test results that … weren’t good.’
‘Is it treatable?’
‘It’s one grade away from being the most serious cancer. The specialist said they need to test if it’s a secondary tumour that’s spread from elsewhere before they start treatment. I need to come back for more scans.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Heidi replied, and to her surprise, she meant it.
‘It’s just come as such a shock,’ Josie continued. ‘I lost my sister to it so I can’t help but think the worst.’ She buried her head in her hands and cried again. Without thinking, Heidi reached out to hold Josie’s hand. Josie grasped it firmly and the two women remained in a contemplative quiet.
‘You must think I’m mad unloading my problems on a complete stranger,’ Josie said eventually.
‘Not at all. Do you … do you have a family who can support you?’ Heidi asked.
‘Yes, my husband and two kids.’
Heidi bristled at her use of the word ‘husband’. ‘Does he know?’
‘No. He works away from home a lot and I’d rather tell him about it in person but I don’t know how to. He’s been under so much pressure at work lately, he’s not eating or sleeping properly and I don’t want to make things any worse for him.’
Heidi knew she was likely to blame for his angst and suddenly, revenge didn’t taste so sweet. ‘Is he a good man?’ she asked.
‘He does his best. Money is tight, he’s a hard worker and I know he loves us. There’s my mum too. She’s in the early stages of dementia and I’m her carer. I don’t know how I’m going to look after her and fight this at the same time.’
‘Sometimes we surprise ourselves, we don’t realise how strong we actually are until we’re pushed.’
Heidi had dealt with enough bad people in her career to recognise the best and worst of them, her husband aside. Her instinct was that Josie was one of the good ones whose only mistake was to fall in love with a man she hadn’t known was already married. She didn’t need to know the truth, at least not now.
By the time Heidi’s car pulled out of the driveway the morning of the £100,000 handover, she had made a decision. She’d met a woman who needed her husband more than Heidi did. Revenge no longer mattered; for Sam to watch Josie fighting cancer would be more punishment than Heidi could ever inflict.
When she was to confront him later at the locker in Milton Keynes where he was to leave the holdall, she would tell him their marriage was over, but wouldn’tmention that she had met Josie or that she was unwell. That was for his other wife to decide.
On her return home, she would, however, tell the children the truth about their father. She was not going to lie to them; they deserved to have at least one honest parent.
Now, Heidi’s plan was in tatters, and to all the world, she was as deceptive and secretive as her husband. The realisation was sudden and the emotion hit her hard. And for the first time since discovering the truth about Sam, she released the grip on her tears. The woman her colleagues had nicknamed Elsa the Ice Queen was starting to melt.
Chapter 50
‘Do I need to ask where your vote is going or can I assume?’ Fiona asked Libby.
Libby’s eyes flitted from screen to screen, skipping over Sofia who remained hidden behind a covered lens. She took in Claire and her unborn baby; Sam, a father of four and husband of two; and his wife Heidi, the woman scorned. Finally, she settled on Jude, the man she had been infatuated with but who no longer recognised any worth in living.
The right thing to do would be to pick someone who wanted a second shot at life, but Jude was not that man. Before her were worthier candidates but who were as flawed as him. She was aware that whatever decision she made, it would weigh heavy on her shoulders. However, try as she might, she couldn’t bring herself to condemn him to death for an illness he had no control over. Libby considered that perhaps he was right in his suggestion that by trying to save Jude, she was making up for her failure to save her brother. She couldn’t be sure. All she knew for certain was that hers was the only vote he was likely to receive and she could not let him down.
‘I’m supporting Jude,’ she said finally, and Fiona added his name to her tally.
‘Waste of time,’ grunted Jack.
With Sam also earning one vote, Claire awarded another and Heidi receiving two, Jude’s death was not a foregone conclusion. Everything now depended upon the public. But they had a taste for blood. They had hounded Shabana to her death and sought to turn Sofia’s car into a travelling pyre. The depth of their hatred without knowing the Passengers’ entire stories appalled her. It was unlikely they would develop compassion for a man who had already planned his own death.
‘Cadman,’ said the Hacker suddenly, and the social media expert jerked like he’d been stung by a wasp. ‘Can you tell us where collective public opinion lies?’
‘Of course,’ he replied. His colleague passed him a tablet and he raised a neatly plucked eyebrow at the data scanning across the screen before him. ‘Well, this makes for interesting reading.’
