by Heidi Perks
But it is Bonnie who pains me most. My fragile sister, already broken. She will take the facts in black and white and decide for herself that she was never a part of our family, that she was right to think she never did belong.
Chapter Thirty-Six
I’ve avoided calls from Bonnie and Dad, messages assembling in my inbox that I couldn’t bear to listen to. Instead I sent them both a brief text telling them I was alright but needed to sleep and we’d speak in the morning.
Only now morning has come and my stomach is bubbling with dread. There is no more word from Harwood. I don’t know what Annie is telling them, but I do know I must face my family.
I’m in bed, still deliberating the thought, when my mobile rings, Dad’s home number flashing. My heart plummets into my already knotted stomach as I pick up.
‘Hello, Stella.’ Olivia’s voice fills the line. ‘How are you?’
‘I’m doing okay. Thank you.’
‘Well, that’s good … Your father’s been worried sick. Hopefully he can put everything behind him now.’
‘Hopefully. Is he there?’ I ask, not interested in engaging in any more one-way conversation with his wife.
‘Yes.’ For a moment Olivia continues to breathe down the line and I wait for her to either tell me he can’t talk at the moment or if he does I’m not to mention the island. It surprises me when she does neither.
‘Stella, my darling,’ Dad says when she passes him the phone. ‘I’ve been so worried.’
‘Don’t be, Dad, I’m fine now.’
‘What happened? What did they do to you?’
‘It’s a long story,’ I tell him. ‘It can wait for another day. The important thing is I’m home and Danny’s been released. It’s good news, isn’t it, Dad?’
‘Yes,’ he says but I hear the word catch.
‘Danny didn’t do it. The police know this,’ I reiterate.
‘No,’ he says quietly. ‘Danny didn’t do it.’
‘Is everything okay?’ I don’t know why he doesn’t seem happy about it. ‘I thought you’d be pleased.’
‘I know, my love, only …’ He hesitates before adding, in no more than a whisper, ‘I always thought he had …’ I hear the pain in Dad’s words as they trail off. ‘Your mum was adamant it was her, but I never believed her. I thought she was protecting him.’
‘You really thought Danny was capable?’ I ask.
‘No, no, it wasn’t like that. I knew it was an accident, I knew he wouldn’t have meant to hurt her. You know Danny,’ he cries. ‘He never hurt anything.’
‘So you and Mum never talked about what actually happened? You never knew for sure?’
‘I thought she was trying to shelter him. But clearly I was wrong,’ he says, as if pulling himself together. ‘So do the police know it was your mother now?’
‘It wasn’t Mum,’ I say. ‘It was Annie.’
‘Annie?’ he roars as I pull the phone away from my ear. ‘Annie?’
Olivia fusses in the background, asking him what’s wrong, demanding he pass the phone to her, but still clutching it he shouts, ‘Leave me alone. Just piss off.’
I reel back. It is the first time I’ve heard Dad raise his voice, let alone swear.
He clears his throat and when he still doesn’t speak I ask him if he’s alright.
‘Yes,’ he says finally. ‘I’m alright. But Annie Webb,’ he growls. ‘She killed Iona? She made us all believe it was Danny?’
‘I know this is a lot to take in, but there’s more I need to talk to you about. Can you move somewhere you can’t be heard?’
‘Olivia’s in the kitchen.’
‘Okay.’ I hold a breath, releasing it slowly. He must be able to hear my nerves. ‘It’s about Bonnie,’ I say, squeezing the words past the tightness of my throat. ‘I know what you and Mum did.’
Questions are freefalling. I’m ready to stop on the one that seems most appropriate. What the hell were you thinking? What gave you the right to lie to us all our lives? Did you never consider what you’d done was wrong?
In the end I say, ‘Annie knew Mum had told Iona what you’d done. I think that was why she was angry enough to let her think it was her fault.’
‘Oh no, Stella,’ Dad groans. ‘Oh dear God, no.’ He starts to cry. I picture him curled into a ball, clutching the phone tightly against his ear. It’s a pitiful thought, yet for once I feel no sympathy for him.
Isn’t it too late to break down now, Dad? Forty years on. It doesn’t escape my notice how lucid he is. It’s like taking him back to such a significant moment has anchored him in a way nothing has for a long time.
‘We should never have done it,’ he sobs. ‘We should never have done what we did.’
‘What?’ I cry. ‘You can’t say that. You can’t regret Bonnie.’ The tightness inside me squeezes harder until every muscle in my body is clenched. I’d thought I wanted him to show remorse, but now I know it’s not what I want to hear. ‘You can’t tell me you wish you didn’t have her?’
‘No. I don’t know,’ he cries. ‘It was wrong. It was so wrong, and your mum could never see it.’
‘But you must have made the decision together,’ I say angrily. ‘You can’t blame it all on Mum.’
I want him to defend what they did, not regret it. I want to hear him tell me they had no choice because they loved Bonnie and they wanted to give her a better life. I don’t want to listen to him snivelling down the phone at me that they should never have taken her.
‘Of course we did. Of course we did,’ he repeats, more quietly.
‘So why did you?’ I plead. ‘Tell me why you did it, Dad.’
‘We were young and desperate for a family. And your mother had lost two babies and we thought— We thought we couldn’t have our own. I love Bonnie. You know that.’ He pauses. ‘But we shouldn’t have done it.
‘Does Bonnie know?’ he asks.
‘Not yet,’ I snap. And I’ll be the one to tell her, won’t I, Dad? It should have been you but neither of you could do it.
My fingers tingle from where I’m gripping the phone. Blood races through my veins, heating my skin. I’m angry that I won’t get what I now realise I want from him. I wanted what Ruth had given me – a refusal to believe they’d done anything wrong. A conviction I think I’d have seen in Mum.
‘It wasn’t your mother.’ Dad is sobbing into the phone. ‘I was the one who told the girl what we’d done.’
‘Oh God—’ I start as Olivia’s voice breaks in.
‘I don’t know what’s going on,’ she says, and I realise I’ve lost him.
‘Nothing’s going on,’ I snap as I hang up the phone.
Only now do I see snatches of my parents’ relationship for what it was. I can picture them sitting in front of me as I draw a portrait of their marriage and it’s clear they could never have moved past what happened.
They’d done something they never agreed on. That made Dad tear himself apart with guilt to the point he admitted it to Iona, while Mum tried her best to hold us together. They didn’t stand a chance of survival in the end.
Ten minutes later my doorbell pierces the silence. I expect it to be Bonnie and pull on a jumper before opening the door, but it’s Detective Harwood.
‘I’m sorry, I got you out of bed,’ he says, eyes drawn to my pyjama bottoms before quickly returning to my face, a pinkness appearing on his own. ‘I wanted to bring something by and I – how are you feeling?’ he asks, as if registering he should have phoned first.
The truth is, physically, I feel much better today but I’m not ready to be hauled in for more questioning. ‘Like I just want to sleep,’ I tell him. ‘And sick,’ I add for good measure.
Harwood’s front teeth clamp down on his bottom lip. ‘I was hoping we’d be able to finish our conversation, Ms Harvey. Annie Webb has started talking.’
He must know this would stir me and I’m unable to hide the fact as my fingers drum against the door frame, my foot scuffing anxiously on
the mat.
‘I rather hoped some more of your conversation had come back to you,’ he goes on.
I give a small shake of my head and, when I don’t say anything, he pulls in a tight breath before handing me a carrier bag. ‘What’s this?’ I ask.
‘Your brother asked me to give it to you. We found it in Ms Webb’s house. He says he doesn’t want it.’
I look inside the bag, pulling out Danny’s drawing pad. ‘Oh!’ My fingers trail across its cover. ‘He wanted me to have it?’ I glance up for confirmation. ‘Thank you. Thank you so much.’ He has no idea how much this means to me.
‘Ms Harvey,’ Harwood says, taking a step back as if what he’s about to say is just an aside when actually it’s anything but, ‘Annie Webb is saying it was an accident, that she never intended to hurt Iona Byrnes.’ He pauses, waiting for this to register. ‘I really need you to recall if anything to the contrary was suggested in your conversation the night before last.’ It’s clear he believes it was.
But Annie is saying it was an accident. That means she’s suggesting there was nothing pre-emptive about what happened. Nothing linking her to Iona, nothing that would help Harwood drag up the past. It means not only is she protecting Bob, she’s protecting my parents too. And after she’d so carefully manipulated it to look like Mum’s fault.
It’s possible Annie has weighed up her options and considered a charge of manslaughter is better than admitting the truth.
‘Ms Harvey?’ Harwood’s head hangs to one side. I blink and look up at him.
I need to tell him the truth. I have to. But I still need to speak to my sister first.
‘I’m really sorry, I still don’t …’ I wave a hand in the air. ‘I’m hoping after some more rest …’
He shakes his head and sighs. ‘We need to finish that statement,’ he says, raising his eyes before finally turning away. ‘I’d be grateful if you could come into the station later.’
I slam the door shut behind him, clutching Danny’s book to my chest. I can’t do this for much longer, I think, tearing myself away and going back to bed.
Laying the book across my lap, I stare at its cover. It reminds me of the feeling I’d have when I opened my advent calendar. The anticipation of what would be inside. Finally I open the first page. An envelope has been wedged into the spine. Tugging it free, I reach inside and pull out a letter.
Dear Stella
I want you to have this book. Do with it what you like – burn it if you want – but there might be a part of you that wants to look. You were always begging me to when we were kids!
There was a time I wanted it back more than anything, but the cost of that became too great. I haven’t even been able to look inside because I know I’ll see memories of a summer I’ve spent my life trying to forget.
When Mum came into my bedroom and told me Iona was alright, I knew she was hiding something. I saw it behind her eyes – you always told me I was good at reading people. The next day they told us we were leaving but I never believed Iona could be dead. My fifteen-year-old brain thought she’d threatened us and Mum panicked.
Mum gave up everything to keep me safe and it was too much of a burden for me. After seven years I couldn’t do it any more and had to get away, start afresh. I hated seeing you beg Mum to take us back when I knew she never would and I blamed myself for everything, including Dad leaving.
But before that summer we were happy, weren’t we, Stella? We did have a great life on Evergreen, and what’s happened will never change that.
I’m also happy in Scotland now, it’s where I want to be, but if I let myself acknowledge it there’s one thing missing, and that’s you. I miss you, Stella. I miss the feeling of knowing you were by my side in the treehouse.
I’d like it if we could write to each other and maybe, one day, you might come up and visit.
Danny
Tears stream down my cheeks as I press my brother’s note against my chest. No matter the distance between us, we will be forever tied together. ‘Yes, Danny,’ I say, ‘I would like that very much too.’
Chapter Thirty-Seven
‘It’s good to see you,’ I smile when Bonnie turns up. ‘I’ve missed you.’
‘Yes, well, if you go gallivanting all over the country like some crazed Miss Marple, what do you expect?’ She breezes in before looking at me carefully. ‘You could have been killed. You know that, don’t you?’
‘I do, actually. But it is good to see you, Bon.’
‘I worry about you,’ she murmurs as she takes off her coat and lingers with it in her hand before I sling it over a chair. An overwhelming scent of perfume hangs in the air. ‘Why are you looking at me so oddly?’
I shake my head and glance away. ‘I didn’t know I was.’
‘You were. You were staring at me. Have I got something on my face?’ She reaches a hand and swipes at her chin.
‘No. I wasn’t looking at you in any way,’ I say as she walks off to the kitchen. I take a breath as I watch her go.
It’s weird seeing her again, a face I’ve known my entire life, only now I know we’re not related. The similarities I’d once told myself were there must have all been in my head.
‘Thank God you have no need to carry on your little search now, though.’ She stops in the doorway and turns back. ‘I assume you don’t, anyway?’
I shake my head. ‘Coffee?’
‘Yes.’ She moves out of my way and stands by the small breakfast bar, her fingers scratching its surface.
‘I’m not offering you anything stronger,’ I say as I fill the kettle.
Bonnie doesn’t reply and I don’t look at her as I hear the scrape of a stool against the tiles. ‘So Annie is our killer,’ she says flippantly. When I turn I can tell by the way she leans forward, her eyes wide, that Bonnie is shocked. ‘Why did she do it?’
‘She’s saying it was an accident,’ I reply carefully, ‘but it meant Mum left the island thinking it was Danny.’
Bonnie nods slowly. ‘But then she drugged you. Was she going to kill you too?’
‘I don’t know,’ I tell her, though I’m certain she was. ‘I guess she was scared.’ I avoid telling Bonnie that I’d overheard Annie’s plan to get rid of me. Or that only moments before Meg arrived she’d been about to hit me over the head with her carriage clock.
Bonnie’s fingers have stopped scratching but they trace circles on the surface between us. ‘You know, Luke wants to book us a holiday. To Jamaica,’ she says suddenly. ‘Why do I want to go to Jamaica?’
‘Why don’t you?’ I laugh. ‘It’ll be amazing.’ I know she has changed the subject through fear. As much as Bonnie has plenty of questions, she isn’t sure she wants to ask them.
‘It’ll be hot,’ she goes on.
‘That’s a good thing.’
‘Yes. I suppose.’ I see the flicker of a smile on the edge of her lips before it passes. ‘You are looking at me weirdly. Will you just tell me why, because you’re beginning to freak me out.’
‘I’m sorry.’ I hold up my hands. ‘It’s just so much has happened. I’m relieved to be back. And safe.’
Bonnie seems to accept this but says, ‘So I’m assuming you did go back and see Iona’s mother on Sunday? When you told me you were coming home.’
‘I did.’
‘Right.’ Her shoulders rise and fall quickly as she battles her need to know and her resistance to hearing it.
‘Iona is definitely not your sister,’ I tell her.
She looks up.
‘I promise. She isn’t.’
‘How do you know?’ she asks, her breath slowly releasing.
I open my mouth to tell her it’s Jill, but for now something stops me. Instead I reel out another lie. ‘She showed me a photo of the baby. It looks nothing like you. She had ginger hair.’
Bonnie looks away as tears swim to the corners of her eyes. ‘Oh God,’ she says finally. ‘Oh my God.’ She lets out another deep breath and laughs as I slide on to a stool o
pposite her. ‘I was so sure Mum was lying. But she’s really not?’ She turns back, her eyes imploring me. ‘You’re telling me the truth.’
‘I am, Bon,’ I say, reaching for her hand. ‘But—’ I start as she carries on speaking over me. I can’t let her revel in relief when I still need to tell her what she’s most dreaded hearing.
She is talking about Mum, bringing up the Stay and Play sessions again. ‘Maybe it was my jealousy of Danny,’ she says, reassuring herself there was nothing more to it. ‘Maybe that’s why they took me. I mean, I hated him as soon as he was born.’
‘That’s really why you didn’t get on with him?’
‘Yes. I think it was really,’ she says.
‘So what about me?’
‘Oh, you were different. I couldn’t shake you off. I tried, but you just hung around me, and in the end I suppose I grew to love you.’ Her voice has the carefree tone of someone who’s received good news.
‘You know, I read this article about being the oldest sibling the other day,’ she starts, and when she turns back to me the edges of her mouth twitch up.
‘Oh yeah?’ I smile.
‘It said one of the most positive experiences of being the oldest sibling is nurturing the younger ones. Apparently my doing that has expanded my ability to be sensitive to other people’s needs. Think I got that spot on, didn’t I?’ she asks, her eyes sparkling.
I squeeze her hand a little tighter. I could leave her blissfully unaware for longer but what good will that do? Our family has lived a lie for over forty years and Bonnie deserves the truth.
‘I don’t know what I’d have done without you all these years,’ she is saying. ‘You know that, don’t you? I don’t tell you as much as I should, but …’
‘I know,’ I say, when she doesn’t finish.
She tilts her head to one side and I can see she’s scrutinising me again. I realise I must be staring. ‘What is it?’ she says finally. ‘What aren’t you telling me?’ She pulls her hand away, clutching hers together in her lap.
