‘Digestion?’ I say, retching again. I’ll never be able to unsee the fatty mess in the freezer. ‘Oh, Sasha, no, dear God…’
‘It’s digesting her too,’ Marion says, her voice thin and cold. ‘But it’s taking too long. Sean said it really needed heat, though it will work eventually. Water and lye. A good old-fashioned solution. Sean knows his chemistry.’
‘Sean… oh God. But I don’t understand why Sasha is even here at the farm. Marion, tell me, what’s going on? And why are you involved with this?’ I can’t take it all in, the implications, how Sasha has ended up in the game freezer. After everything.
Marion begins mopping again, covering the same spot over and over. ‘I only stopped by that night because I saw Natalie’s car outside your place,’ she says, glancing up at me, almost a smile on her face. ‘I’d found Natalie’s bracelet down the back of my sofa and popped it in my bag for when I next saw her. I’d gone to the church meeting at the vicar’s house and, on the way, spotted Natalie at yours. But when I got to the vicarage, the meeting had been cancelled and no one had bothered to tell me. So I drove back, hoping to catch Natalie to give her the bracelet, but it turned out she’d already left. I felt so bad not being able to babysit, I thought I’d call in anyway, see if Alice was OK, if Sasha was coping. I’d nothing else to do.’
The expression on Marion’s face tells me she’s being truthful, that she’d wanted to help. She must have dropped the bracelet while she was there.
‘Go on,’ I say, drawing closer. Anything to get further away from the freezer.
‘Sasha was doing her homework when she let me in, but I could tell she was upset.’
That figures, I think, remembering. She’d seemed different when Sean and I went out, her mood low.
‘I knew she’d been crying,’ Marion goes on, leaning on the mop. She stares out of one of the louvre windows, the sunlight casting slatted shadows over the stone slab.
‘Crying?’
‘Well, she was still crying,’ Marion goes on. ‘I asked her what was wrong and she said that Dan’s mother had upset her, calling her stupid, that kind of thing. She was trying to brush it off but I could see she was distressed.’
‘Natalie upset Sasha?’ I take another step away from the freezer. ‘Why was she even there?’ Alice was right, then. Natalie was in our house.
‘Apparently Dan had left one of his schoolbooks there and she insisted that Sasha find it. You know how Natalie can be. Impatient, demanding.’
I nod.
‘Dan wasn’t there, of course, and Sasha did her best to find the book, but Natalie gave her a hard time. The thing is, it was the final straw for Sasha. She… she told me she’d already got a load on her mind, that she was upset anyway.’
I remember thinking the same as we left for our evening out. The taxi was outside and I was talking to her while Sean was doing something in the kitchen. I’d told him to hurry up.
‘While I was there, I went upstairs to check on Alice. It sounded as though Natalie had caused quite a commotion. The poor lamb was hiding under her duvet with Mr Flumps. I calmed her down, read her a story.’
‘I’m glad you were there, Marion,’ I say. ‘Did… did Sean know you’d come round?’
‘Yes,’ Marion says, pushing the mop again. ‘I phoned him soon after. And sent lots of texts. I didn’t want to disturb your meal, but didn’t know what else to do. I had to… Well, things had happened, Libby. Bad things.’
‘Marion, what? What happened?’ I take both her wrists in my hands.
‘Sit down,’ she says, pointing to the two big tubs of caustic soda. I nod, leading her over. ‘I don’t feel well,’ she says. ‘I’m a bit light-headed.’
We sit down, our knees pressed close, our hands clasped tightly.
And Marion begins to talk.
Forty-Six
‘So many tears for a young girl, it broke my heart,’ Marion says, pulling a handkerchief from under the frayed cuff of her sweater. She blows her nose. ‘Plus I wasn’t about to leave her in that state in charge of Alice. I wanted to know that she’d calmed down, could be responsible.’
‘Thank you, Marion.’
‘But I should never have asked her what else was wrong. Should never have pried, but how could I not? She was so upset and she knows… knew… who I was: Sean’s mother. She couldn’t help herself, all those feelings towards him bottled up. It all just came tumbling out.’
‘Sean and Sasha,’ I whisper, resigned to what I suspected all along. My head drops; I hate myself for doubting Fran, even for doubting Natalie. ‘But she’s a kid. How could he?’ I barely have any tears left to cry, especially when I recall the look Sean gave Sasha as we left. He thought I hadn’t noticed but I had – a last, longing gaze over his shoulder as we went out for the evening.
Marion looks puzzled for a moment, frowning, but continues anyway. ‘After I’d settled Alice, I went and sat down in the living room. Sasha was even more emotional, telling me everything she knew. She just spilt it all out as though she couldn’t contain herself, as if it was somehow my fault. And I didn’t like what I was hearing. I didn’t like it one bit.’ Marion shakes her head, bites her lip, deep in thought, as though she’s back there. ‘I thought it was all in the past.’
‘I can imagine, Marion. I’m so sorry. Sorry for the both of us. Him being with Sasha… it’s unforgivable. So much of this is unforgivable.’
Marion looks at me as if she doesn’t understand. ‘She only found out by accident, you know. It’s strange how these things stay buried for so long then resurface when no one’s looking. Old secrets playing out.’
Eric’s words flash through my mind again: Keeper of all secrets…
‘Such a huge thing for a young girl to harbour,’ Marion continues. ‘But it was what she’d done about it that I didn’t like. I haven’t spent nearly twenty-five years covering this up for nothing, you know.’ She wiped her face on her sleeve. ‘And Fred… oh, Fred…’ More tears come.
‘I… I don’t understand. Marion?’ That’s when I realise we’re talking about different things. ‘What secrets?’
‘It wasn’t an accident, love. Sean’s leg,’ she says, sniffing.
I make a face, wiping my own tears away. ‘What do you mean?’
‘It was his father. He did it.’ Marion shook her head. ‘He went for Sean with a shovel all those years ago. It was the nearest thing he could find in the barn. He was relentless, hitting him over and over, trying to beat it out of him. His leg took the worst of it, but, dear God, he almost killed him. For many years after, Fred wouldn’t speak to his son. And Sean took a long while to recover physically, but more so emotionally. Though I doubt he ever has really.
‘But you know what?’ she went on. ‘He never said a word against his father, telling the doctors he’d had an accident instead of the truth. Of course I felt wretched that I did nothing to protect Sean, that I was as terrified as he was. And anyway, I felt very differently about it all. He’s my son. But Fred is old school, Libby. It’s just his way. You’ll never change people like him.’
‘I… I still don’t understand. What’s this got to do with Sasha being so upset?’
‘She knew, Libby. Sasha knew the secret. And… oh…’ Marion buries her face in her hands, the tears coming hot and fast. ‘First his marriage to Natalie broke down, and then I thought you’d leave him too… I couldn’t risk it going wrong again, the family being torn apart. It’s all been so perfect and I just wanted to keep it that way.’ She sniffs, blowing her nose again. ‘For Sean. He’s been through so much and needs a good woman in his life. But it was for Fred too. I’ve been stuck in the middle for all these years.’
‘What secret did Sasha know, Marion?’ I’m freezing again, my entire body shaking as I sit holding my mother-in-law’s hands, trying to push the image of what I saw in the freezer from my mind.
‘I’m afraid I lost it, Libby. I’m not proud that I shouted at Sasha. It’s the last thing the young lass needed after
Natalie had laid into her. She was upset enough as it was. But when Sasha told me that she’d left a note on your car, trying to warn you, I just saw red. Sean is with you, and she was going to ruin everything. Your family, Libby. I was trying to protect your family.’
I shake my head, hardly able to believe it was Sasha who left the note. ‘But why would she admit to her affair with Sean? Why would she tell me?’ And then it dawns on me. ‘She wanted to split us up so she could have him for herself…’
Marion pauses for a moment. ‘No… no… what are you talking about? That’s not how it is. Sasha wasn’t having an affair with Sean. For God’s sake, if only it were that simple.’ She squeezes my hand. ‘I tried to calm her down. She was pacing about, crying one minute and getting angry the next, going on about how her little brother would be devastated if their parents split up for good, how she needed to protect him too because he was still young, that she had to save their family unit. It was awful.’
‘Oh, Marion…’ I imagine the scene playing out as Sean and I were eating our crab claws, tearing into the focaccia, sipping on red wine.
‘When she’d calmed down, I asked her if she’d eaten. She looked so thin, so pale. She said she hadn’t been able to stomach food for days, so I went to the kitchen to heat something up for her.’ Marion bows her head. ‘Sasha told me you always put something special in the fridge for her because…’ She chokes back a sob. ‘Because of her nut allergy. She told me specifically which meal she could eat. I told her to leave it to me.’
I nod, barely listening, wondering if what I gave her – the chicken in a creamy turmeric sauce, her favourite – is now decomposing in the freezer along with the rest of her.
‘But I did something terrible, Libby. It was as though I wasn’t myself, as if someone else had taken over my thoughts. This voice in my head told me everything would be OK if only Sasha wouldn’t tell the secret. Couldn’t tell the secret.’
‘What are you saying, Marion,’ I whisper, grabbing her by the shoulders. ‘Tell me!’
‘I heated up a meal for her, even making her a cup of tea, and brought it in on a tray. It looked very similar to the food you’d labelled and left for her, but… but the one I gave her was a chicken satay. She didn’t even eat much of it. Hardly anything really. Just a few mouthfuls before she got upset again, hysterical almost, saying she was going to tell you everything, that you deserved to know the truth.’
‘About Sean having an affair?’
Marion nods.
So it is true. I close my eyes.
‘Then, after another mouthful or two, Sasha slammed the tray down on the table and was pulling odd faces. She went bright red, standing up and lurching towards me. I didn’t know what to do. Then she started throwing stuff around – her backpack, almost as though she was looking for something, but making a terrible mess too. I was scared by what I’d done, Libby. Can you understand that? I was really scared and instantly regretted it. She’d trusted me. I didn’t mean to push her, but she came at me, spluttering with her eyes bulging and her arms flailing.’
I cover my mouth as Marion tells me her story, matching everything up with what Sean and I found when we got back from the pub – each of us caught up in our own problems, completely unprepared for what we would discover after the taxi dropped us back.
I’ll never forget the sight of Sasha’s contorted face when I went into the living room, staring up at the ceiling as she lay sprawled on the floor.
Dead.
‘She fell, Libby. Sasha dropped to the ground and hit her head on the corner of the coffee table. And I just watched her.’ Marion sobs, choking back more tears. ‘Her mouth was so huge and her eyes… they were just gone. Taken over by all this… face.’ Marion gestures her hands around her own face. ‘It was as if her features had grown to twice their size. Her hand was reaching out to something on the floor – some kind of medication in a tube, so I grabbed it away from her. There was blood coming from her temple and by now her skin was covered in this… this rash. It was awful to watch but I was doing it to protect Sean, to protect both of you. I couldn’t have her ruining everything.’
‘Shit,’ I hear myself saying, though it doesn’t sound like my voice any more. I imagine Sasha trying to get to her EpiPen – the EpiPen that Sean threw on the fire, knowing that Marion’s fingerprints would have been on it. ‘Christ, no.’ I think back, my hand over my mouth, racking my brains. I remember what Sean said to me – how he’d blamed me from the moment he saw Sasha’s dead eyes staring up at us. And I’d believed him, blaming myself too. He said that I must have given Sasha the wrong meal and she’d had a massive and fatal anaphylactic reaction. I just didn’t know how it had happened. I’m always so careful. I remember him going into the kitchen as soon as we got back, leaving me to discover Sasha’s body. He must have disposed of the nut-free meal, protecting his mother.
‘Marion, what colour was the lid on the food you heated up?’
‘It was red. Yes, yes, I’m certain of that. A glass dish with a red plastic lid and a “chicken satay” label on it. The other dish in the fridge, the one you’d labelled for Sasha, had a green lid. It said “nut-free”.’
Sasha knows to avoid anything that doesn’t have a green lid on it. Vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free, nut-free… they all have their own colours. And, because she didn’t heat up her own meal, she wouldn’t have known it contained nuts. I did leave out the correct meal; it just didn’t get eaten.
‘As soon as it happened, I phoned Sean in a panic,’ Marion continues, her face crumpled from worry. ‘I was absolutely frantic. I didn’t know what else to do. I instantly regretted what I’d done, that I’d killed her, but I knew Sean would understand why, that I was trying to stop everything coming out. It all happened so quickly. And her face… I just can’t get it out of my mind.’
‘No, me neither, Marion,’ I say, thinking of the puffy, disintegrating remains in the game freezer. Sick rises up my throat again.
‘Sean didn’t answer his phone, so I called over and over. Then I sent text messages asking him to call me back. I wasn’t sure if he even had phone reception in the pub and I didn’t want to disturb you both, but this was… well, it was an emergency. I should have called for an ambulance, but after what I’d done, I was just too scared. Sean finally called me back from the pub toilets and I confessed everything. I told him that Sasha knew, that she’d intended on telling you everything, Libby. He said he’d take care of it all, that I should go home immediately, that he’d come back right away. He said Alice would be fine left alone for fifteen minutes. I hated leaving her but I’d told him she was finally asleep.’
I shake my head, cradling it in my hands. ‘Oh God,’ I whisper, thinking back over Sean’s plan. It was riddled with holes from the start, though not so much a plan, I’m now realising, but a set-up. He knew Sasha was dead before we even left the pub, had had just enough time to concoct a story, putting the blame on me. Sean convinced me everything would be OK if I just did as he said, went along with him. But why?
‘What did Sasha know, Marion? What was she going to tell me?’
Marion stares at me, blank-faced, ignoring my question. ‘Sean told me to deny ever being at the cottage, and that if Alice had heard anything, she wouldn’t know what had been going on, that the word of a confused and sleepy child wouldn’t count anyway. But now it all just seems so wrong, Libby. Sasha is dead and I killed her. I feel so wretched, but I acted on impulse. And since then, I’ve had to keep…’ She stares over at the freezer. ‘I’ve had to keep yet another secret.’ She sighs, crossing her chest. ‘I just can’t do it any more.’
Marion clutches at my hands again, desperate. ‘Sean’s been coming up here when he can, adding more of this stuff to… to make it, to make her, go away.’ She taps the caustic soda tubs, a familiar sight on the farm, usually stored under lock and key. ‘And now he’s been arrested, when it should have been me.’ She lets out another sob. ‘I’ve been a fool, lived my life as a lie, all f
or nothing. I can’t let it all be in vain.’
‘Secrets are only secrets if you keep them, Marion,’ I say, clasping her hands tightly.
Everything will be OK…
Sean’s words after he’d hit me. It was the shock of finding Sasha, seeing her swollen and lifeless body, my subsequent hysteria that had made him do it. He’d panicked, needed me to shut up while he figured out what to do.
‘Sean, no,’ I’d said, my face smarting. ‘We have to call the police. Our babysitter is dead.’
He’d stared at me, hatred in his eyes. ‘This is your doing, Libby,’ he’d said coldly. ‘And I’m not prepared to have my life ruined over it. My career and family destroyed because of your carelessness – or, worse, your jealousy.’ He’d paced about, occasionally stopping to stare at Sasha lying in the mess – the spilt food, the contents of her backpack strewn about, blood on the rug, her skin red and blotchy. ‘I will sort it out. I will clean it all up and make it go away, but you have to do exactly as I say. Do you understand?’
Fear had made me believe him. Made me believe that I had killed her, that I’d left the wrong food out, knowing full well she had a severe nut allergy. ‘The police will think you planned it, Libby, that you thought the note was about Sasha, that you were convinced she was having an affair with me. That you had a grudge. That you wanted her dead.’
My head – shaking and disbelieving – finally turned into a frantic nod. I knew he was right, not even caring if he was telling the truth about any affair or not. That was the least of my concerns.
‘Do you want Alice to be without a mother while you spend the next twenty years in prison?’ he’d said, pacing about, agitated.
Sitting silently on the window seat, the curtains pulled closed behind me, tears had poured down my face, my head shaking slowly. ‘No,’ I’d sobbed. ‘No, I don’t.’
Date Night (ARC) Page 29
