Scarlett looked at Bridget then, and rolled her eyes dramatically.
‘It’s only a jigsaw puzzle, Mummy!’ she said, before turning her attention back to her great-grandparents, who were still in the process of putting the thing together for her.
‘See!’ Bridget giggled then, as if Scarlett’s mindset only proved her right.
‘She’s forgotten all about it already. She’s stronger than you think.’
Nancy smiled then.
As much as she wanted to believe that was true, she knew it wasn’t.
Even at only four, Nancy could see it. How Scarlett bottled everything up inside her and just got on with it. How she hid her true feelings from the world.
Nancy knew, because Bridget was right, Scarlett was just like her.
Well, from now on her daughter was going to be her only priority. The businesses could take a back seat.
If anything, the last few days had shown her exactly where her priorities lay.
With her family. Her daughter.
The businesses could practically run themselves. Nancy had enough people around her, working for her, that she could trust. It was time to step back.
Scarlett might not be over her ordeal a hundred per cent, but Nancy would do her damnedest to be there for the girl from now on.
To make everything all right.
‘Right. There’s four pieces left to go. Auntie Bridge, Mummy, Daddy and me,’ Scarlett said, bending back down on the floor before passing out the last remaining pieces of the puzzle.
‘I’m doing the last bit though, okay!’ Scarlett announced, picking it up and placing it in the middle of the picture.
‘Of course you are, darling. You’re the final piece of the puzzle. The bit that holds us all together,’ Joanie said proudly. Beaming at the child that reminded her so much of Nancy when she’d been that age.
Scarlett seemed happy with that.
Standing back and admiring the joint effort that her family had all made.
‘Okay, everyone. Good job. Give yourself a round of applause.’
They all laughed then. Clapping away as Scarlett Byrne did a little curtsey in the middle of the room.
In her element to be back home, surrounded by the people she loved the most in the world.
The people that made her feel so safe.
‘Nanny Colleen’s going now, Scarlett. Give her a kiss goodbye, and Daddy too. You’ll be in bed by the time he’s back from dropping her home.’
Doing as her mother told her, Scarlett kissed her grandmother and father, before running up the stairs to where her Auntie Bridge had promised to read her a story from one of the new books she’d bought her.
Nancy shook her head, smiling still.
Glad that Scarlett was still taking this all in her stride.
‘It’s been lovely having all the family here together. Just the tonic she needed,’ Nancy said, hugging Colleen to her, and planting a kiss on her cheek. ‘Thanks for everything. I’ll see you tomorrow, Mum,’ she said then, before giving Jack a peck on the cheek and following Scarlett up the stairs.
‘Well that’s a turn up for the books,’ Colleen said. Her palm going up to her cheek. To where Nancy had just kissed her. Startled at her daughter’s rare show of affection, she followed Jack, as he led her out to the car.
As Jack, ever the gentleman, pretended not to notice her tears.
Letting her have her moment.
Mum. She hadn’t heard Nancy call her that for years.
Not since Nancy had been small, probably about the same age as Scarlett was now.
Colleen being the one to find Scarlett, to tell Nancy that she’d found her, had somehow broken the curse between the two women.
Nancy was eternally grateful, and Colleen really appreciated that.
For the first time in a very long time, there was hope. Maybe, just maybe they could start building bridges between them now.
Getting into the car, Colleen leant her head back against the seat, as Jack drove in silence.
Glad of the quiet. Colleen was lost in her thoughts.
She’d barely even noticed that they’d pulled up outside her flat in East Sheen until Jack turned off the engine.
‘You all right?’ Jack said, seeing the raw emotion etched on the woman’s face. The tears still in her eyes.
She shook her head.
‘We need to talk.’
Jack nodded. He’d known that this was coming. He’d been waiting for it, in fact. The past few days, so swept up in getting his daughter back, and making sure that everyone was okay. But he’d seen it in Colleen’s eyes.
How the woman was suddenly looking at him.
There was a coldness there now that he’d never seen before.
‘Is there something you want to say to me, Colleen?’ he said then, convinced that there had been more to the story that Colleen had fed Nancy about just finding Scarlett inside Jimmy’s car. That she hadn’t set eyes on Daniel.
Jack had known straight away that wasn’t true.
‘You saw him, didn’t you?’ he said then.
Glad that at least Colleen had waited. That she hadn’t simply blurted out whatever Daniel had told her about him to the rest of the family. To Nancy.
‘I did, Jack,’ she said sadly. Not bothering to add the state that Daniel had been in. Jack didn’t deserve to know how much her son had suffered. He didn’t deserve to know a single thing about him.
‘He told me all about you, Jack. I know.’
He nodded. He didn’t expect anything less from Daniel if he was honest.
Already bracing himself for that fact.
Colleen’s cold hard stares eating into him the past few days.
That knowing look in her eyes.
‘I know that you were there when Jimmy was killed, and I know you were behind the attack on Nancy.’ Colleen spoke so directly now. Glad that they were finally alone. Glad that she could finally ensure that Jack knew his place.
Jack closed his eyes.
Knowing that this was coming, though it didn’t make it any easier to hear.
Daniel had told Colleen everything.
Even now, after all of this, he still wanted to ruin any chance Jack had of not being found out, that he’d been in all of this too.
‘I love her, Colleen. Genuinely. Like I’ve never loved anyone before.’
He stared straight ahead of him. His eyes fixed on the busy high street. The blur of headlights that passed them both. The people walking on the pathway next to them.
‘I didn’t know that Daniel was going to kill Jimmy. You have my word on that. I swear.’
‘But you were happy to take half the ransom money. Blood money, as Daniel called it,’ Colleen spat, shaking her head.
Jack put his head down then, his voice low. Full of remorse.
‘A lot has changed since then, Colleen. I need you to know that I’d never do anything to hurt Nancy. Not ever. You have my word on that…’
‘Your word means nothing to me.’
Jack took a deep breath.
Of course, why would it?
He’d lied and cheated his way into this family. Acting as if Daniel was the monster in all of this, when he wasn’t completely innocent himself.
Colleen had every right to hate him, to out him.
‘I’m not interested in your word, nor am I interested in your pathetic excuses. But there is something that I want you to do.’
Praying that she wasn’t going to ask Jack to walk away from Nancy, from his daughter too. That she wasn’t going to force him to lose everything he cared about.
Jack braced himself for the worst.
As long as it wasn’t that, he’d do anything.
Anything so that Nancy never found out the truth.
‘I’ve never been the best parent, that’s no secret as you well know. And I’ve lived a lifetime regretting my choices. One thing I’ve learned is you can’t go back. You can only go forward. I know my Nancy makes you happ
y, and Christ knows, you do her too. She lights up around you.’ Colleen shook her head. Remembering that feeling so well with her Jimmy. How she’d fallen under his spell. So unaware of everything he was deep down inside. So oblivious to it all.
‘Nancy and Daniel are both my children. My blood, and I need to do right by them both. So I’m asking you, as of tonight, to set Daniel free. Stop looking for him. Whatever you have to tell Nancy, however you have to do it, leave him be. It’s time for this family to stop fighting. To stop the constant feuds. To let the past lie where it needs to be, behind us all.’ She may have been a shit mother, but Daniel and Nancy were both her children and this war between them needed to stop before they both ended up dead.
‘From now on, you do right by my daughter. No more lies. No more secrets. And you leave Daniel alone. Stop searching for him. Then and only then will your secrets be safe with me,’ Colleen said, laying down Daniel’s terms, though this was her insurance policy too.
This way no one would ever find out, not even Jack, that she’d asked Daniel to pull the trigger on Jimmy all along. That she was the real person who initiated Jimmy Byrne’s murder.
Sealing their agreement, Jack nodded at Colleen’s veiled threat, watching as the woman got out of the car and closed the door behind her, before disappearing into her flat.
Aware that Colleen had just thrown him a lifeline, that this was his last and final chance.
As much as he begrudged the fact that Daniel was still out there somewhere, that the bastard had got away with everything once again, Colleen was right.
Scarlett and Nancy were his priority now.
Daniel could have his freedom.
As long as he stayed the fuck away from Jack and his family.
They were the only things that mattered now.
Forty-Five
He could hear a noise.
A strange far off beeping.
Though somehow he knew he wasn’t here alone in the complete darkness.
He was lying down?
Aware of the heaviness of his body, numb, as if it was being weighed down by something.
He was trapped somewhere?
Trying to get up, to roll on his side, to lift his head, only he couldn’t move. He couldn’t even open his eye.
Where the fuck was he?
He started to panic, claustrophobic then.
The darkness all around him, swallowing him up. Engulfing him.
His heart beating rapidly, as he felt someone’s presence nearby.
Someone was here with him?
He could sense them. So close to him that he could almost feel their breath on his skin.
Yet they seemed so far away too. So far that he couldn’t get to them. He couldn’t reach them.
Nancy?
Was she here with him?
That bitch.
What had she done to him?
What had that bitch done to him?
Trapping him here. Wherever the fuck here was.
He felt something then. The light touch of skin.
Warmth. Then a sharp, short, electric shock sensation. Like a jolt. Something stabbing him in his arm. Scraping at him, before being sunk inside his flesh.
A needle?
Everything around him melted away then.
The noises in his ears gradually subsiding. Slipping off, far into the distance.
The darkness getting bigger, expanding all around him until it swallowed him entirely.
Until he was gone.
Marie Huston took the syringe out of Daniel Byrne’s arm.
Robert, she reminded herself again.
His name was Robert Parkes. She should know. She had been the one who had named him, after all.
And it was the perfect choice. Robert suited him.
Much better than Daniel ever did.
She smiled then, as she stood next to his bedside. Watching her Robert lying there, in his drug-induced coma, so peaceful now. As if he was merely asleep.
He looked just the way he had done that very first day she’d met him. Lying peacefully in his hospital bed, on that fateful day, working at the High Dependency Unit at the hospital.
Comatose once again, unable to move or speak.
It was a shame really. Unfortunate that it had come to this, but it was for the best all round. Marie understood that now.
She hadn’t really cared much for Daniel Byrne if she was completely honest.
He hadn’t been a very nice person.
With his demanding ways and his volatile temperament.
The way that he spoke to her with that constantly irritated tone; the way that he bristled at the idea of her wanting to get close to him. For them to be together.
He’d always fought it.
The inevitable.
As soon as Robert had started to remember who he was, it had got worse. Much worse. It was as if, suddenly, Daniel Byrne had invaded Robert Parkes’s body. Taken him over. Daniel had filled Robert’s head with all sorts of nasty, angry notions.
Obliterating the man that Marie had first fallen in love with until there was almost nothing left.
Only Marie had saved him now, hadn’t she? She’d saved him from himself.
It had to be this way.
It was the only way they could be together again. Properly.
Here in her new flat.
Where no one would come looking for her. All these months of paying the rent here, of keeping this place a secret. Putting all of the official paperwork and tenancy agreements in a false name. Tricky, but not impossible. And worth it now it was done.
They’d be safe here. No one would ever find them; they wouldn’t even know what to look for.
It was just the two of them, together now. Soul mates.
Surrounded by the beeping machinery. The monitors and equipment that had been painstakingly slow and difficult for her to steal from the hospital.
The fact that she’d had to take each item singularly. To sneak it out after her shift and hide it in the back of her car.
Piece by piece, over the course of the last six months.
Things went missing in hospitals all the time. Moved around, placed in the wrong ward.
Still, she had taken her time so as not to draw any attention to herself, or raise any suspicions.
Though of course, that nosey old cow Nurse Langton had started to suspect her. She’d made it difficult for her then.
Poor Nurse Langton. Rumour had it that the woman was killed in some random hit-and-run.
Such a shame.
Silly woman!
It was bad enough that she’d suspected Marie of taking the medication, yet the woman wasn’t smart enough to connect her with all the equipment she’d stolen too.
The stupid woman had thought that Marie was stealing to make Robert feel better, to take away his pain, when in actual fact she’d been preparing for this.
For her Robert’s homecoming.
Keeping him with her, in an induced coma.
Here with her, forevermore now.
Marie looked at the photo then, that she placed carefully on the cabinet beside Robert.
Her and her baby sister.
She’d lost Cassie, but she wasn’t prepared to lose Robert too.
She wasn’t prepared to live the rest of her life alone.
She closed her eyes then, the pain still so raw.
Cassie wasn’t even supposed to be home that day. There had been no way that Marie could have ever known.
She’d thought her sister had gone to school. She should have been at school!
Her father was doing his usual of taking his mid-morning nap.
Exhausted, the poor man. Such a tiring job, living on the social and sitting on your big, fat arse watching TV all day, before spending all night in your youngest child’s bed.
Striking the match, Marie had watched the flame flicker with fascination at first, as the stick began to blacken. The heat licking at her fingers, as if encouraging her to do it. Egg
ing her on. Forcing her to drop it down onto the sofa and start the fire.
She had no time to think after that.
It was done.
The flames growing quickly, lapping wildly against the fabric, spreading up the wall behind the chair.
The heat becoming so intense that she could feel the warmth on her face.
The crackling noise growing louder, as the flames got higher. Hitting the ceiling then.
The curtains catching light too.
That had been her cue to leave.
Locking the door firmly behind her.
The room would be up in flames soon, an inferno.
By the time her father realised, it would be too late; he wouldn’t be able to escape. He’d have to come through the lounge to get to the front door, but he wouldn’t be able to pass through the wall of fire that she’d created, and the door was locked.
He’d be trapped here, inside. Eight floors up. With no way of getting out.
The fire would get him, the smoke choking his lungs, the intense heat cooking him from the inside out.
Just as he deserved.
To burn in hell for all that he’d done to her and Cassie.
She’d waited then, further down the street, keeping out of sight, watching as the plume of black smoke poured out from the eighth-floor window, as the fire engines roared past her, and people gathered outside at the front of the flat. Other residents, passers-by, all staring up at the inferno in horror.
She imagined him in there, choking slowly to death.
His skin blistering from the heat. Dying in the most painful way possible.
She’d waited for what felt like hours.
For the fire to be extinguished. For people to gradually start moving away.
For his body to be brought out.
Only there had been two bodies inside the flat that day.
At first she’d thought that her eyes were deceiving her when the second trolley had been wheeled out. A second body, hidden away inside a black body bag.
Smaller. Like that of a child.
Marie knew instantly, her legs going from beneath her, as she let out a heart-rending scream.
Cassie.
She’d been in there too.
The Forgotten_An absolutely gripping, gritty thriller novel Page 30
