“What? No, this isn’t—”
“At least this explains why he’s done a runner.”
“What?”
“He’s gone, love, taken off. Packed a bag yesterday afternoon and I ain’t seen him since.”
Libby blinked at the man. “Are you sure?”
“Shut it, Vincent!” he shouted at the dog behind him, who’d started to bark again. The animal immediately fell silent and the man turned back to Libby. “I heard him chatting on the phone and then he packed a bag and left. I wasn’t sure why, but now I’ve seen you, it all makes sense.”
Libby’s head was spinning. There was no way Dylan would have left, not the night before Frank’s assessment.
“It turns out he’s just like his mother, after all.” The man gave a leering smile, revealing yellow smoke-stained teeth. “That bitch did a runner too when he was a little ’un; did he tell you that? Couldn’t cope with being a mum, so she pissed off in the middle of the night and left me to deal with him.”
My god, poor Dylan. Libby couldn’t imagine what that must have been like, to be abandoned by his own mother and left with this... this brute.
“Have you registered him as missing with the police?” she asked.
The man let out a sharp laugh, which quickly dissolved into a fit of violent coughs. Libby watched as he hacked and choked for a solid minute. When he stopped he was wheezing heavily. “Of course I haven’t registered him missing, because he ain’t. He’s probably gone off with that other bird.”
“What other bird?”
“Oh, I don’t know her bloody name, but they’ve been on and off for years. She’s some waster punk like him.” The man gave another harsh cough. “I thought they were off again but it was her who called him yesterday. He’s probably moved in with her, so you can’t chase him down for money. He’s always been a tight bastard.”
Libby opened her mouth to defend Dylan, but no words came out. Dylan’s father was watching her with that horrible smile.
“I’ve got to go,” she said, suddenly desperate to get away. “If you see Dylan, please will you tell him to call Libby?”
“I won’t waste my breath,” the man said, and Libby turned and hurried away, his cruel laughter chasing her down the walkway.
CHAPTER
38
Libby spent the bus ride home in a daze. Had Dylan gone? She couldn’t imagine him deserting Frank with no warning; it seemed so unlike him. But what if Dylan had turned up at the house yesterday, seen Simon there, and assumed the worst? And then there was this whole girlfriend thing. Surely Dylan would never have kissed Libby and said what he’d said if he had a girlfriend? He’d always struck Libby as honest and trustworthy. But then again, she’d always thought Simon was honest and trustworthy too, and look what had happened there. Libby shuddered and the baby gave a restless kick.
Libby got off the bus on Kentish Town Road and walked back toward Rebecca’s house. As usual, the baby settled once she was on the move, and as Libby walked, she composed a message to Esme telling her what Dylan’s father had said. She left out the bit about the girlfriend, the words too unreal to type. Libby was pressingsendas she turned through Rebecca’s front gate, and then she stopped dead. The front door to the house was hanging wide open.
Libby felt the blood draining from her face. Had she shut the front door when she left this morning? She was always so careful, but she’d been distracted about meeting Dylan andmight have forgotten. Her legs were shaking as she crept up the front steps. Were the burglars still in the house, or had they gone already, taking all of Rebecca and Tom’s valuables with them? Libby still had her phone in her hand, and as she reached the front door, she dialed 999. She was about to presscallwhen she saw a flash of movement at the end of the hallway and then heard a familiar voice.
“There you are, Elizabeth.”
“Mum?”
“Well, don’t stand there like a lemon. Come on in.”
“I thought you guys weren’t back until Friday?”
“Change of plan—we flew home early.” She came forward and gave Libby a dry peck on the cheek. “Happy birthday, darling.”
“Is everyone okay?”
Her mum looked up and down the corridor to check no one was in earshot, then lowered her voice. “Rebecca took a pregnancy test in France and...” She tapped the side of her nose.
“Oh, wow, that’s amazing!”
“Shh, you did not hear it from me!” Pauline hissed. “Of course, the second Rebecca found out, she wanted to rush back to London. I mean, the Dordogne is lovely but you can’t trust the French not to sneak blue cheese or raw meat into your food.”
