The clock in the hall ticks loudly and the old radiators rattle as the heating comes on. It’s bitter cold outside now, I can hear the rain lash against the windows.
The police van has pulled up, officers are coming in, dressed in white suits, carrying cases and bags and lights, and people are asking questions. I can see curtains twitching across the street. A neighbour’s car pulls up, but he doesn’t go straight into his house, despite the cold. He stands and watches. I see him lift his phone. The word will spread quickly.
It’s late now. After ten. I’m exhausted and I can feel my nerves jangling. I want to do just what DI Bradley suggested and go elsewhere while the police pull the house apart, looking for God knows what, but Ciara has stated her intention to stay, as has Kathleen, and there is no way I’m leaving them to it. I dread to think what they could say or do to point the police in my direction. I’m still hoping the pathologist, for all his experience, is wrong. Not that Joe didn’t deserve to be murdered – but just that the thought of there being a killer in our midst is unsettling and exhausting.
I yawn. ‘I’m really tired,’ I say as Alex and I sit together in the living room.
We haven’t spoken much since DI Bradley left. I don’t think we know what to say to each other. We’re in shock.
I rest my head against Alex’s shoulder and feel that he is tense. Guilt washes over me for embroiling him in this mess. I feel him kiss my forehead. It’s typical of him that he is trying to comfort me.
‘Curl up here,’ he says, wrapping his arm around me. ‘Take a nap here on the sofa if you can. I’ll not leave you.’
He has barely finished talking before I’ve started to drift off.
I jump awake to Marie’s voice, loud and distressed, in the living room.
‘It’s a nightmare,’ she says. ‘A nightmare.’
Ciara walks into the room and flings herself at her mother as if she is still a child and the pair sob loudly, dramatically.
‘I didn’t hurt him. I didn’t do anything,’ she sobs, her shoulders heaving up and down.
Marie pats her back, kisses the top of her head the way Alex had kissed me. They rock together, keening and sobbing, and Marie whispers over and over again that of course she knows that Ciara did nothing. Sure, Ciara doesn’t have a bad bone in her body. She would never …
‘I wanted to make it right between us,’ Ciara cries. ‘I thought we would have time. I thought he would’ve …’ She descends into floods of tears again.
It feels as if they are putting on a show for the police’s benefit. There had been no obvious indication before now that Ciara had wanted to make anything right with her father. Like me, she was tolerating him out of a sense of duty. This display does nothing to reassure me that a narrative that will ultimately point the finger of blame in my direction is being played out in front of me.
I can’t bear to listen to them or watch their spectacle unfold any more, so I go to the kitchen, where I’m surprised to find Kathleen alone, her mug in her hand. No police officer is near.
‘That big tall fellah has gone to make a phone call,’ she says. ‘I’m surprised he left me alone. If you’re making a fresh cup of tea, I’ll have one. This has gone cold.’ She gestures to the murky beige liquid in the cup in front of her.
I hadn’t been planning on making a cup of tea at all, but I fill the kettle and switch it on anyway.
‘I just keep running everything over and over in my head all the time. Trying to make sense of it,’ she says, her voice cracking as she struggles to keep her emotions in check. ‘I can’t help but wonder what they found … what they saw …’ Her sentence drifts off.
I don’t answer her. I simply make her tea and stir in a sugar before sitting it in front of her.
‘I should’ve come home earlier,’ she says. ‘I should have, as soon as we knew he was sick. Sooner even.’
‘Sure, we didn’t know how sick he was. Not until the operation.’
That operation had changed everything. When his treatment had turned from curative to palliative. When we knew we were in the end game, we had a limited time to say all we needed to say and do all we needed to do. She came as quickly as she could after that.
We sit in silence for a bit, our thoughts doing enough talking for us.
‘Things are very strained between you and Ciara, aren’t they?’ Kathleen asks.
I shrug. I don’t know what she wants me to do. I can’t deny it.
‘It’s been a very stressful time for everyone. You know things have always been challenging between us. Between all of us.’
She nods. ‘I thought once you two girls grew up, you’d see some sort of common ground. It can’t have been easy for Joe, dealing with his illness and the two of you at each other’s throats.’
I’m annoyed. We were hardly at each other’s throats. Yes, the tension was palpable, but we just did what we had to do while ignoring each other as much as humanly possible. There’d been no screaming, roaring rows.
I’m not sure how to answer. ‘I’m not sure what you mean,’ I stutter.
Kathleen moves awkwardly in her seat. ‘Ciara says you’ve been cold with her, and I’ve seen it myself. Telling us all you couldn’t wait to sell the house? And that was before he even …’ She doesn’t finish the sentence, can’t bring herself to say that he has died. ‘Look, I understand that this is a stressful time but, you know, given everything, it’s not a good look for you.’
‘Given everything? What exactly are you implying?’ I say, feeling heat rise in my face. My heart rate starts to increase.
‘I’m not implying anything,’ she answers.
‘Yes, it’s true there’s been no love lost between us, but that’s not all down to me, Kathleen. You know that. You were there, remember? I tried to be a friend. As a child I tried, but she drew a very straight, very deep line in the sand and she’s never wavered from that. And now? Well, now I’m big enough and ugly enough to choose not to pander to people who clearly don’t give two damns about me.
‘But that doesn’t mean I’ve done anything wrong. I’ve been protecting my feelings. I’ve been protecting my family. I’ve not set out to hurt anyone. Not your precious niece and certainly not Joe. Though, God knows, there’s little love lost there, either. But that doesn’t mean I killed him, for the love of God!’ I whisper the world ‘killed’, afraid to say it out loud.
‘You are a cruel person, Heidi Lewis,’ she says bitterly. ‘I’m not saying he was perfect. I know his flaws, but he did the best he could for you when no one else wanted to. You never showed him any love. Any respect, even. Is it any wonder Ciara thinks you’re responsible for what happened?’
‘She can think what she wants, Kathleen,’ I snap. ‘It doesn’t make it true.’
There’s so much that I want to say. I want to tell her I showed him more love and respect than he ever deserved. That I had hurt myself by not breaking contact with him. That I had kept his sordid secrets because I was too ashamed of myself to admit them to anyone. I know I could shatter her illusions with a sentence or two – but what good would it do now? As far as I could see she had made up her mind, just like Ciara, and anything I could say would only be dismissed as the lies of a bitter woman.
‘There’s no need to get upset,’ Kathleen says.
I look at her incredulously. She’s just confirmed my suspicions that Ciara is pointing the finger of blame at me, and I’m not supposed to get upset?
‘There’s every reason to get upset,’ I tell her. ‘I see what’s going on here. I know Ciara isn’t the only person who thinks I’m to blame. Because of course I’d be to blame. Poor Heidi. Unhinged and mad. Sure, it was only a matter of time before I did something really bad, wasn’t it?’ I mock.
Kathleen has the good grace to blush, but I see how her body language changes, too. She tenses, pulls herself away from me a little. Does she think I’m not done? Does she think I’ve more people to despatch from this earth? More people who have wronged me? Because I’m sure she knows she wronged me, too.
Each of the McKees is as bad as each other and I won’t be the fall guy for their twisted ways any more.
‘I’m not saying that at all,’ Kathleen says meekly.
‘But you’re thinking it,’ I say, my voice low. ‘It’s written all over your face.’
I’m about to say more, when DC Black comes back into the room. As quick as anything, Kathleen is on her feet making him a cup of tea, even though he says he’s had more than enough for one day.
I think we’ve all had more than enough – of everything – for one day. I’ve had more than enough for a lifetime.