Adam’s gaze shot to his. ‘Money? What money?’ His mouth ran dry as he realised he probably knew the answer.
‘It came suddenly out of nowhere,’ Ryan supplied. ‘Jemma said it was left to her by some distant relative who’d died. It was bullshit. I checked her online banking. The deposit was made by Cassandra. I think she paid Jemma to keep quiet about the baby. I’m not sure what she told Josh, but…’ He stopped, clearly choked.
Cassie paid her off? Paid her to keep quiet; to keep the information from her husband?Why?Adam had no idea. What he did know, though, a jagged picture forming in his head, was thatthathad somehow led tothis. That realisation hit him like a sledgehammer.
‘Jesus Christ.’
Fifty-One
Cassandra
Samuel wasn’t where she’d imagined he might be. She’d gone straight to Jemma’s house having found no one at the cottage. Jemma hadn’t been home. The place had been in darkness, no cars on the drive. She’d come back to the cottage, but there was still no one here either. Peering through the rivulets of rain that ran down the conservatory window, Cassie could see the place was empty. An icy drip of water snaked its way down her spine as she surveyed the upstairs windows. She wouldn’t easily gain access that way, not without the next-door neighbour seeing her. Shivering, chilled to the bone, she made her way to the back door. She would get in by whatever means. Kim had to come back sometime. She would wait all night if she had to. Victory was never won without a battle. And Cassie knew how to fight. She’d fought all her life.
The back door was solid. She was about to try the kitchen window when a thought occurred to her. Going around to the front of the cottage, she pulled out Adam’s key ring – and there it was, the spare key Kim had given him so he could let himself in to finish the wardrobes. Cassie had wondered about that, why she would trust him with a key to her house – as Kim had known she would. She’d planted her seeds of doubt well. Insidious little things that they were, they’d taken root and grown until Cassie couldn’t see anything past them but the suspicion that had turned her into the monster Kim had wanted Adam to see. She’d wanted him to leave her. Had shewanted him for herself? Cassie wasn’t sure. She was certain, though, that Kim hadn’t wantedherto have him, the only thing worth having in her life… apart from Samuel. Kim had guessed that after losing Josh, she would bond with him. She’d lied about her friendship with Jemma, Cassie had known she had. Why in God’s name hadn’t she confronted her then?
Pushing the door open, she slipped silently inside and quickly checked the downstairs rooms. There was no one there, no sound but for the slow drip of the kitchen tap. Ignoring the crumbs on the work surface, the baby bottles that hadn’t been swilled, she made her way upstairs, instinctively checking the nursery first. He wasn’t here, her beautiful grandson. Crossing the room to place the flat of her hand on the empty cot mattress, she felt a deep sense of bereavement. Had he ever lain here at night, in the nursery she’d so carefully chosen the woodland theme for?
Her chest tightening, she shoved Kim’s bedroom door open. Casting a glance around, she noted the pink satin dress abandoned on the floor, the frilly underwear adorning the bed. Had Adam succumbed to her charms? Cassie had been so sure he’d cheated on her. The signs were all there. The body contact, the coy glances, the hair on the bed. But who had initiated the contact? The coy glances were all Kim’s. The hair, how else might that have got there?
Realising how easily she’d jumped to conclusions, nausea swilled inside her. She still didn’t know whether they were wrong or right, how far Adam might have been tempted, but she would never forget the fear and confusion in his eyes when she’d viciously turned on him. Swiping tears from her face, she closed the door and went along the landing to push open the door to the small box room.
Stepping in, her heart jolted – and then stopped dead.
She couldn’t quite take it in at first, the cork tiling decorating one of the walls, the many photographs pinned to it. A montage of photographs, mainly of her son. Josh out walking. Shopping in his casual clothes. Waiting at Worcester train station in his smart work clothes, disembarking at Birmingham.
Her breath caught painfully in her chest.
Bewildered, she studied them. They’d been taken over a period of time. She could tell by the changing seasons, by the length of his hair. It needed cutting in some. She would have nagged him to do that. Her eye was drawn to one she recognised, one she’d taken herself, the photograph that had gone missing from her hall. She had wondered about Kim that first time, when she’d found the photograph missing after she’d gone. But then, she’d imagined that Kim was as upset as she was, that she might have taken it as a small memento of Josh.
Her eyes drifted to the train timetables also pinned to the wall. That first visit, the emotional letter that followed it… Kim had wheedled her way in. She’d stalked Cassie’s son, manipulated him. She’d stalkedthem. Cassie took in the other photographs. She herself appeared in some of them, coming to and from the house. Mostly, though, they were of Adam. He was smiling in one or two, a sad, contemplative smile but one that still reflected his caring nature. In others he was pensive, distracted. She recognised the look. His mind would have been on Josh, his insufferable loss.
Tempted to rip the photographs from the board, to tear everything of Kim’s to shreds, tear her flame-red hair from her head, she swallowed the hatred burning her throat and backed quietly away instead. Her jaw clenched, her heart thrashing wildly, she was heading back to the stairs when her phone vibrated.
She needed to switch it off. She needed to be quiet, invisible until she was ready to make her presence known. Instinctively she checked it, and laughed, a short, hysterical bark. Kim, creative little thing that she was, had thoughtfully sent her another photograph.
Why would she do that, she wondered, send her a photograph of herself in her short, tarty pink dress with her arm draped around Adam’s neck? She was evidently unaware that the man she’d mercilessly manipulated, cared nothing for, had been on to her. This photograph was presumably designed to be the final push that would send Cassie over the edge. Not content that she’d already turned her into a demented, screaming harridan in front of her husband, she wanted to rob her of everything, including her sanity. Did she not realise this might be the final straw that would break her back? That Cassie, driven as far as she’d been, would cheerfully snap her neck?
Fifty-Two
Kimberley
‘Bloody rain,’Kim cursed as she pushed through the front door of the cottage. God, what was the matter with the weather? Huffing irritably, wishing she’d remembered to take her brolly, she banged the door to and went straight through the lounge to the dining room, selecting Jemma’s number on her phone as she did. She cursed silently as it went straight to voicemail, again. ‘Great time to do a disappearing act, Jemma,’ she muttered, moving nearer to the large mirror she’d propped on the mantel shelf until she’d figured out where to hang it, wiping the mascara from under her eyes.
The woman didn’t deserve a reliable child-minder. She didn’t deserve a child. She had no idea how to be a mother to him, barely had time for him, in between her job and bleating on about her post-natal depression. She should try Kim’s life on for size. Some people didn’t know they were born. Jemma had everything: her own little family, a beautiful house. Kim was buggered if she knew what more she could want.
She’d almost felt sorry for her when she’d first made contact. She’d been watching her in the nightclub, trying to work out what it was Jemma had to offer compared to her, what it was that had Josh so besotted. Not a lot, as far as she could see. The woman had been a mess, dancing like someone possessed on the dance floor, knocking back vodka shots, so many Kim had been surprised she’d made it to the exit, let alone to the street outside, where she’d puked out her guts.
Feeling a smidgen of sympathy as Jemma had retched and sobbed, Kim had gone to her, held back her hair, wondered if it might be to her advantage to befriend her. When she’d blurted that she was pregnant, Kim had feigned sympathy and surprise. Listened attentively as she’d told her what a terrible person she was, that the baby wasn’t her husband’s. This much Kim knew. She’d smiled kindly. ‘You’re not a bad person,’ she’d told her reassuringly. ‘You wouldn’t be sobbing your heart out if you were.’
Jemma had said Kim had saved her, joked she was her green-eyed guardian angel as their friendship had deepened and she’d taken such good care of her baby. And now this was how she repaid her, too self-centred to even return her phone calls.
‘Jemma, it’s me,’ she said, making sure to keep her voice concerned as she left a message. ‘I’m worried about you, wondering if you’re okay. I’m a bit worried about Liam too, to be honest. Call me back, sweetheart, as soon as you can.’
Like now.Where on earth was she? Kim had got no answer when she’d gone over there and knocked on the door, and now she really was growing worried. She couldn’t keep telling Adam the baby was with a friend. She was sure he was beginning to wonder. She’d had to ad lib like mad the last time he’d quizzed her.
Sighing, she examined her eyelashes at close quarters, trying to decide whether to get a lash and brow tint, and then, catching a movement in the mirror behind her, she stopped, her blood freezing.
Shit.Fear slicing through her, she whirled around. There was someone there. She was sure there was. Her heart pumping manically, she scanned the darkness beyond the French doors that led to the conservatory. She’d seen something grey and ghostly flitting by past the…
