Josie swallowed another mouthful of wine. “I wouldn’t say it’s selfish. But if you’re afraid of Aiden, you need to get some help. Jake might be right about it not being safe for your newborn with Aiden around. It isn’t Aiden’s fault and it isn’t your fault. It’s the bastard who took him’s fault.”
“Do you remember him having behavioural problems when he was little? I can only remember the good things, but maybe that’s because of what happened to him. I think I’m blanking on anything bad because I can’t stand to think about it.”
Josie sighed. “Honestly? Hugh had more patience with him than I did. Don’t get me wrong, he was a lot of fun, but he was a bit… tiring.”
“And?” I prompted, sensing that there was something she wasn’t saying.
“He was a bit moody, Em. He used to have tantrums quite a bit.”
I frowned. I remembered him throwing a wobbly in a supermarket once but he was neverthatbad. I was getting to the point where I couldn’t trust my own mind. Why did I keep pruning away the bad times?
An hour later, I left Josie’s house and made my way down the gravel drive to my car. The wind had whipped up, and it howled through the Rough Valley Forest below. I turned my head towards the second hill overlooking Bishoptown. There it was: Wetherington House, standing tall and proud above the village. At one time the village was owned by the Duke of Hardwick, though the family had sold much of the land since those days. The house had been closed to the public since the police inquiry, but I knew there was a goods entrance at the rear of the property because I’d once snuck in with Rob. It was a dare we’d had while drinking Lambrini on the grounds of the house.
I got in the car and started the ignition. Butterflies tickled at my stomach, but I knew I needed to get some answers. Though I was filled with nerves, I tried my best to back out of Josie’s drive carefully, and warned myself not to let my adrenaline take over like it had the day I went to the GP surgery. No, I needed to keep a cool head.
It was a short drive to Wetherington. The scene of Bishoptown spread beneath the hill in a patchwork of green fields and forest dotted with small cottages and local pubs. Who would think that a monster lived in this beautiful place? No one had suspected a thing, and that was the most dangerous aspect of this entire sorry story. No one had even an inkling until the day Aiden stumbled out of the woods. He had brought his own abuse to our attention, but he held the full story locked up tight inside.
If Aiden wouldn’t tell me what had happened, maybe someone else would.
I navigated the twists and turns down the driveway towards the stately home. In order for this to work, I needed to make sure I knocked on the door of the private wing of Wetherington. I had no idea if the duke and duchess were even living in the mansion at the moment. Perhaps they had nipped up to a private residence in the Highlands, or a summer cottage in Devon. DCI Stevenson hadn’t gone into much detail about the conditions of his bail.
I hesitated for a moment after lifting the handbrake. What was I doing? What if I was arrested? I scratched at the angry red rash between my thumb and forefinger as I worked up enough courage to open the door. This was for Aiden, but it was also for me. I needed to talk tosomeonewho might have some answers.
Before I left the car, I pulled off my thick cardigan. I was already sweating. I didn’t need the extra layer, even with the winds. The gravel of the back drive was difficult to walk on, especially when carrying extra weight at the front of my body. I was completely off balance and forced to stumble my way to the back door. But I got there without anyone telling me to clear off and I knocked on the old oak wood. Three raps.
I’d expected Wetherington to be something like Downton Abbey, with a butler ready to answer the door. That wasn’t the case at all. A small, stooped woman with greying but neatly set hair opened the door. She looked me up and down, no doubt taking in my shocked expression, and her lips thinned to a tight line.
“Do you know who I am?” I asked. The words were strange coming from my mouth, especially given who I was facing, but then I wanted her to know. I wanted her to know who she was looking at.
“I do,” she said. “You’d best come in.”
ChapterThirty-Two
As I followed the back of her tasteful cream cashmere cardigan, it struck me that I had absolutely no idea what to call this woman. Would I call her Duchess? Or would I call her Mrs Graham-Lennox? Or what about Maeve, her actual name?
“He isn’t here,” she said. “In case you were wondering.”
The thought had entered my mind. As soon as I stepped foot over the threshold, I’d wondered whether the man who took my son shared the same breathing space as I did. That was, if hehadtaken my son.
“I asked him to leave,” she said, stepping through an ornate doorway into a small but beautiful little sitting room adorned with antique dressers and racehorse paintings. “I couldn’t have him here in this house with me. Not after the things the police found on his computer. I’d shared a bed with that man for over fifty years, but not for another night. Would you like a cup of tea?”
“No, thank you,” I said. Since entering the house, I had found myself feeling more and more like the teenager who snuck onto the property as a dare with her boyfriend. I clutched hold of my bag and stared at the beautiful antiques like a child in a posh department store. I certainly didn’t want to spill anything.
“Make yourself comfortable,” she said, gesturing to a floral sofa with mahogany legs.
“Thank you for letting me come inside. I didn’t expect you to.”
She laughed as she settled into a red velvet armchair across from the sofa. “I bet you didn’t.” Her make-up was perfectly applied, with pink lipstick and a little rouge on her wrinkled skin. She sat with her legs crossed, and cut the figure of a woman holding everything together. “I wanted to meet you. I’ve wanted to meet you ever since my husband was arrested. I feel somewhat responsible, you see. Though I had no idea about the lengths of my husband’s… obsession, I did have a suspicion that I constantly ignored.” She moved her hand in a vague, swatting motion. “I never knew for certain, and I never knewwhatwas wrong, but I always suspected that my husband had a dark side. This may sound extremely trifling after what you’ve been through, but you have no idea how much pressure I have been under to maintain certain standards throughout my marriage. Divorce was not an option for me fifty years ago. So even when I realised I’d married a dud, there was no going back.”
“But if you thought he was amonster—”
“What is a monster?” she asked. “Is it a scary ghoul hiding behind the bedroom door? Is it some sort of beast with sharp fangs? No. Those things don’t exist. Monsters are men and women just like us, and they have the ability to hide their true face. No, I didn’t think I’d married a monster, I thought I’d married a homosexual. I never caught James looking at children inthatway, I only knew that he wasn’t particularly interested in me. We managed to continue the family line, but that was about it.”
“And your kids?”
She shuffled uncomfortably and removed her glasses like she was stalling for time. “I’ve broached the subject with them. Neither remember him doing… anything.” She closed her eyes and I realised that she had removed her glasses in an attempt to distract me from the fact that she was trying not to cry.
“If you didn’t know, it isn’t your fault,” I said.
