‘Now yes, but I’ve only just arrived. I saw someone running away from the house, they left the front door open,’ I stammer.
‘Do you often visit your mother in the middle of the night?’ the taller policeman asks as the other one bends down to check George. My breath catches in my throat.Please let George live.
I suddenly realise how suspicious it looks for me to be standing here in the middle of the night, with blood over me. George’s blood. I wish I hadn’t come now. I should have stayed at Jodie’s.
‘I was worried about my mum. I think someone is trying to harm her. There was a fire here yesterday…’
Paramedics arrive, and another police car. The house is rapidly swarming with police.
‘I think you’d better come to the station with us and make a statement,’ the police officer says.
‘Someone was running away. Someone broke in,’ I tell them.
‘You can tell us all about it at the station,’ he says. He looks around. ‘Is there a door camera or any kind of security camera here?’
‘Mum didn’t like them. She felt that she was being spied on,’ I say. The times I’d asked her to get a doorbell camera for securityreasons. Nick always supported her too. He didn’t even want a doorbell camera at our house.
Theories are spinning around in my mind.Who has done this? Who had such a grudge against George that they would want to kill him?
Maybe the same person who attacked Alison, because I’m not convinced that was an accident.
Was that the same person who’s been targeting us, sneaking into our house?
If only I’d got a better look at whoever was running away.
Then I recall how my first thought was that it was Nick.
God, no. It couldn’t be!
But Alison hinted that he was hiding something. And there was that anonymous text I got about asking him what really happened when my father died. And he didn’t protest about me going to stay at Jodie’s, it was as if he wanted me out of the way.
I shake my head. It couldn’t be. I don’t believe it. I won’t believe it.
70
NICK
I put the phone down, my hand shaking. I can hardly take in what Jodie told me. George has been attacked by an intruder, and Lizzie is down at the police station being questioned. ‘Lizzie wanted me to tell you,’ Jodie says. ‘She’s in pieces, Nick.’
I can’t understand why Lizzie phoned Jodie instead of me. Surely I should have been her first port of call? And why is she being questioned? I asked Jodie that and she replied that she presumed it was because Lizzie was at the scene of the crime.
I can’t get my head around it. Who would want to kill George? I want to go to the police station and see Lizzie, but the kids are asleep and even when they wake I can’t really take them with me, can I? I’ll have to wait until they are at school. I realise for the first time how frustrating it must be for Lizzie to not be able to go and check on her mum when she wants to. To be so close yet unable to pop in.
Suddenly a message pings in. It’s from Jodie.
I’ve just thought, do you want me to come over and sit with the kids while you go to the station and see what’s happening? It’s no problem. I’m awake anyway feeding Freddie, and Millie is with Kyle.
I reply straight back to say I’d be really grateful if she could do that, and she texts that she’ll be here in ten minutes.
I have a quick shower and pull on jeans and a top. The kids will be awake in a couple of hours but they’ll be fine with Jodie, they’re used to her. She’s like an aunt to them.
I’ve just got downstairs and am grabbing a drink of water when Jodie messages:
I’m here.
I open the front door.
‘I didn’t want to ring and wake the kids,’ she whispers as she follows me inside, carrying Freddie in his car seat.
