JESS

“Are you sure this is what you want, one hundred percent? Because once we press go, there’ll be no going back.” I rest my elbow on the bucket of cleaning products, my legs stretched out on the cardboard floor, too tired to worry whether I’m sitting in ketchup or paint. I was going to give the place a good scrub tonight, but it turns out I haven’t the energy to lift a cloth.

“Yep, one hundred percent.” Priyanka picks at her tights, pulling off a dust ball. “As soon as Katie told me what he’d told her, I knew he’d lied to me. He gave me a different story—that he’d had no involvement whatsoever... And to think that I trusted him. What an idiot. I thought we shared everything. I told him everything about me.” She sighs. “And now I can’t stomach being near him. When it’s over, it’s over, you know?”

“Yeah, I do. I’m sorry.”

“What a nightmare.” She kicks a shriveled apple, sending it across the floor where it lands with a bump against the mattress. “Do you think she knew what she was doing when she wrote to us—basically destroying our marriages?”

“I’d like to think it wasn’t as calculated as that, but how can we know for sure?” I look at the painting of Holly above the mattress. Cryptic, dressed all in white, frustratingly mute. “I doubt we’ll ever know whose daughter she was either.”

“Does that even matter anymore?”

“No, maybe not.” I glance sideways at Priyanka. She sounds so weary and seems older, quieter. Can hair make you quieter? I guess when it was loud pink before then it can. “I still can’t get used to your hair.”

“In a good or bad way?”

“Good. But it doesn’t look like you.”

“I can assure you it is me. I’ve still got the shabby parka and Doc Martens look.” She points at her neon-laced boots, wiggling them.

“Maybe you’ll go back to pink hair someday.”

“Maybe.”

We sit in comfortable silence, which is all that’s comfortable because the floor is hard underneath us and I won’t be able to stay much longer like this.

Priyanka draws her legs toward her, hugging them, a bandage appearing on her wrist as her coat sleeve rises.

“What’s that?” I ask.

“Nothing. I’m having a tattoo removed, that’s all.”

“Oh. Does it hurt?”

“Not as much as breaking up a marriage.”

I look at Holly’s portrait again, wishing she could tell us what she’d been hoping to achieve. Although it was her mother’s story, without her involvement—her letter—we wouldn’t have known anything about it and would be happily married still.

“Do you think anyone could have lived with a secret like that?” I ask. “I mean, I know you and Steffie wanted to at the start, but do you think you could have actually spent the rest of your life ignoring it?”

“I dunno. I mean, maybe for a while. But eventually you’d start to wonder what else you’d missed. And it would probably show up in other ways.”

“What, like finding out he’s a creep—a bit handsy in the office? And everyone knew but you?”

“No, not really,” she says. “Just that he was a liar.”

I copy her, hugging my knees, resting my chin on them.

When the moment comes, I’ve no idea how to face Max. How do you go from preparing someone’s porridge and packed lunch, to tying a rope around their neck? I always imagined—unrealistically, as it happens—that the law would do it for us, but now it’s going to be us, standing there, telling them that we know about Nicky.

Where am I going to do it, exactly: in the kitchen, the back garden? Do I take him for a walk around the block, go for a drive? And what about the girls? When do I tell them? How?

And if I’m going to find it difficult, how is Stephanie going to manage? Or Priyanka? Should we do it together, round them up? Or would that make it worse?

Priyanka moans, rubbing her shoulder. “I can’t sit here any longer. I’m seizing up.”

“Me too.” I get up, offering her my hand, tugging her upward. She laughs as she wobbles to her feet. I can’t remember whether I’ve heard her laugh before, and it feels like a real shame. “I’m sorry this is happening to you, Pree.”

“You didn’t do it, Jess. This is on them. And besides, it’s happening to you too.”

“I know, but your lad’s just a tot. It’s a horrible age for this to happen.”

“Oh, and you can think of a better one, can you? Your girls aren’t going to fare any better.” She means this as a consolation, and I take it as one. That’s how twisted things have become.

“I wonder what they’ll do...whether they’ll talk to each other?” I put my hands in my pockets, leaning against the wall.

“Who?” Priyanka crouches down, tying her laces.

“Our husbands, when they find out.”

“Dunno.” She straightens, frowns. “I’ve not really thought that far ahead.”

“But do you think they’re close?”

“Doubt it.”

“They must see each other at the club, though, surely?”

“Andy doesn’t go very often. And besides, he doesn’t seem to have told them about the letter, does he...? What does it matter anyway?” she asks.

“It doesn’t. I was just thinking, that’s all.”

I don’t know why I’m homing in on this. It’s just that I keep wondering how well acquainted they are. If the three of us are discussing what to do, will they do the same thing once they know? And if so, will the three of them combined be a stronger force than ours?

I’m paranoid everything will go wrong. It’s a simple enough plan: use the threat of a witness to scare them into doing what we want. Yet it feels very unstable. They got away with it once before. What if the same thing happens again?

They’re liars, criminals who were happy to live unpunished, becoming family men as though the whole thing never happened. They don’t appear to have consciences, so how do we know how they’ll act when cornered?

We don’t know, and that’s what’s bothering me. We can plan all we like from our end, but the truth is, we don’t even know who they are.

I look at Priyanka, my stomach churning anxiously. “Pree?”

She picks up her bag, rubbing her tired eyes. “Yes?”

I shake my head. “Nothing.” I can’t put my worries on her. I pushed for this, so it’s my responsibility to find a way to make it work. And there’s no rush; it’s been thirty years. We can take all the time we need. “Come on. Let’s get out of here.”

Outside in the car park, the pewter moon is hanging languidly in the trees, caught like an abandoned ball. I wonder whether Holly ever stood in this same spot—how she got here in the first place, whether she owned a car or had a driving license, a bank card, a passport. All the humdrum things we take for granted, but that are in fact only given to people whose lives are accounted for.

We stand in front of our cars, shoulders hunched against the cold. “So, what’s next?” Priyanka asks.

“Well, Lucy said she’d help us. So now we need to sit down and work out what we want. I promised Steffie she won’t suffer financially or in any other way. None of us will.”

She nods, the shadow of disbelief on her face. Maybe she thinks it’s a hell of a thing to promise, one that I can’t keep.

“Also, Pree...we need to think about how to go about breaking it to them.”

She looks at me warily. To her credit, she manages a smile, though. “Just let me know when you want to meet and I’ll be there.”

“Will do.”

We hug and there’s real warmth, real affection between us.

“Mind how you go,” I say, squeezing her hand.

“You too, Jess. Call me.”

On my way to Beechcroft, I think about the main points I’d want to get across. We would work things out individually, but from my part I’d be telling Max to leave, with no visitation rights to the girls. It’s up to the others what they do on that score, but I wouldn’t budge. He’s lost the right to be in their lives, as far as I’m concerned.

Financially, we would insist that they continued to support us. If they didn’t comply, we’d threaten to post Holly’s letter on social media, as well as distributing it around their businesses, friends, families. We would also threaten them with the police. Despite what Deborah Scott said about prosecutors discarding weak cases, they wouldn’t take the risk—couldn’t be sure how the law would react, especially if they thought there was a witness.

I don’t need to drive myself crazy with some elaborate plan. They’d be insane to try to outsmart us or create a scene, given that we hold all the cards.

And we do, don’t we? Unless there’s something I’ve missed.

We’ll do it as a group. We won’t tackle them alone, but as a united front. We’re stronger that way—always were, always will be.

I pull up outside Beechcroft and turn off the engine, thinking about Steffie—how fragile she looked earlier. Getting out my phone, I send her a text.

As I go along the corridor to Mum’s room, my phone beeps.