She squares up to me but I hold her gaze and eventually she can’t bear to see my unwavering stance. She falls down in her seat and holds her head.
“Who tells you that you’re worth nothing?”
She doesn’t respond.
“Who tells you that, Hetty?” I repeat.
“Her! Her, okay!”
“Your mum?”
“Yeah.”
“You like Miss Simonovich?”
“Only real deal in this place,” she says, reaching for a pack of cigs she won’t be able to smoke in here. She fondles them anyway. “Only real teacher. Only nice one.”
“What did you do to Liza?” I demand.
“Nowt much. Just warned her off, like. Warned her to stay away from Miss Simonovich, who don’t appreciate no skanky little underclass minxes.”
“Did you never think you were hurting Liza with your words?”
“Na,” she says sharply.
“Why are you here, Hetty?” I ask gently.
She stares me out like she wants me to say it for her, but I can’t do that. Time passes and she fails to find the words. So, she decides to show me instead.
She lifts her top. Her torso is riddled with cigarette burns.
I sit down beside her and move very slowly, taking her hand. I say in concise tones, “Hetty, did your mother do this?”
She responds quietly, “Yep.”
“Hetty, I want to ask you something else. Can I?”
“Yep.”
“Will you agree to be examined and make a statement?”
“Um,” she simply says, and drops fall from her eyes onto her lap.
I bring her head toward my shoulder and no sound emerges. She just cries. I’m just here.
I get a text from Ronnie and take a quick look: Got him. Evidence too. You’ll be rewarded.
All these months of standing on dark corners and waiting to see if anyone might speak. Ingratiating myself with all kinds of people. Worming my way into all levels of the community and seeking people who knew something. Months of sidling up to Uncle Jakey and trying to find something to pin on him. All the time I have missed out on with Jules… when one plucky kid was all it took. One kid on the lookout. I shake my head for a moment. I almost don’t believe it’s over.
I take a deep breath. Then I turn to Hetty and ask, “Will you be okay if we go to my offices? I don’t think you should go back home.”
She nods.
“I shall just let your headmaster know first, okay?”
“Fine.”
“You don’t mind Minis, do you?”
“Why should I?” Her voice is tiny.
“Miss Simonovich, Jules, hates my car. Says it’s a tin can on wheels.”
She smiles briefly while I make a call to Jack.
I drive her and we start the paperwork. The cycle of counselling, examinations, questioning and determining begins for Hetty. She was brave to come forward, so brave.
The few words Hetty manages to say, the ones that will stick in my mind and make me love Jules forever, are, “Mum hates the thought of me doing well.”
Chapter Forty-Seven
Jules
My nails are bitten down to the wick. I am anxiously waiting for Warrick to get home. Liza came to my office at the end of the day and said a thank-you. When I asked her what for, she said Hetty had finally backed off. She knew I must have known what was going on. She slunk out of my office but not before saying, “I felt sorrier for her. You know, somehow I know she doesn’t mean it.” I was desperate for answers so, I had a word with Jack and got the low down on everything that transpired.
Warrick really is my hero, just for being him.
I am desperate to have him in my arms but when he finally walks through the door, he looks sad. His head is hung, his shoulders hunched. He flings his bag and coat anywhere they fall and walks into the living room to collapse on the sofa.
I see he is barely aware of me. He doesn’t acknowledge my presence. I sit down next to him and gently ask, “Do you want to talk?”
“No.”
He wipes his nose and I kneel on the sofa, right next to him.
“A hug?” I endeavour.
He nods and I scoot up right next to him, arms around his shoulders and my cheek against his back.
“Professional conduct and all that. I can’t tell you what she’s been through, but it was horrific, babes.”
“I am so, so sorry. So sorry.”
What else is there to say? Maybe if Jack hadn’t shaken things up, I wouldn’t have bumped Liza into my class. Hetty wouldn’t have gotten so jealous and Warrick would never have been in our school that day, not only to finally nail Uncle Jakey but also to uncover a case of abuse so horrific it might never have been dealt with otherwise.
“She wanted to be caught, Jules. She was desperate to tell someone. She just didn’t know how!”
He bursts into tears and I immediately wrap my arms around his head instead.
“Something else happened today,” I begin, once he has calmed.
“God, I don’t think I could take anything else.”
“No, it was good,” I reassure him.
I pull back and hold his hand.
“Ruby told me Vernon has been a bit friendly. Too friendly, if you know what I mean.”
“What? And that’s good?”
“No, but the way I handled him was.”
He chuckles, “What d’ya do?”
“Crept up on him in the stationery cupboard, put on her voice, and grabbed his bum like he did with her. Then when he turned, and saw it was me, I told him if he ever harassed a woman again, I’d let him know the meaning of harassment. He went as white as a sheet!”
“Oh my god, Jules!”
“I should have ripped his bollocks off but the thing is, I know he doesn’t mean to be so exuberant. He was horrified and admitted he’s head over heels for Ruby and just didn’t know how to go about it. I got her in the room with us and before long, he was apologising on his knees, telling her how pretty she is. They were organising their first date. You should have seen her little face! She was gobsmacked that he really likes her.”
“I don’t know how I have transformed you from a wench to a matchmaker, but you’ll always be a wench to me,” he laughs, grabbing my hand to kiss it.
I stall him and look deep into his eyes, admitting seriously, “I guess you made me realise what love is. When I see it now, I know.”
I kiss his lips and we fall into a long, enduring embrace, which makes me feel weak in every fibre and pore of my being. I love his kisses.
“We also got Jakey, Jules, we got him,” he whispers against my lips, but for some reason there’s no light in his eyes.
“Yeah?” My heart pounds, so happy to know it’s all over. Why isn’t he jumping for joy? Why didn’t he shout it as soon as he walked through the door? “You’re pleased, yeah? It’s all over now. We can make a clean slate, Rick. You don’t have to go out anymore. We can get married and have time away from it all and be happy now!”
He nods. “I guess I just can’t hardly believe it. It seems too easy.”
Sometimes I cannot believe how much we have gone through together. Days like today just prove how cruel life can be, how short it sometimes is, and how easily things can throw you off course, if you let them.
Later I get him in the bath and I hold my arms around him while he lays back against my shoulder. Suddenly I feel like I am the one who’s the hero. There is still something deep down in his soul that he needs rescuing from and I am going to do my damn hardest to exorcise the demon he is battling.
Chapter Forty-Eight
Jules
Christmas Eve
Two months later and we’re preparing for our first Christmas together. We’ve both been busy with work; me with Vernon’s production of Oliver Twist and Warrick with his backlog of cases. Uncle Jakey left a huge legacy to mop up. I don’t envy Warrick. I don’t know how he keeps his head screwed on sometim
es.
I’ve bought him an expensive watch and a snood for his hair, as a joke. There’s the customary sack of CDs I knew he would like, DVDs, toiletries and books. I may have gone a little mad but it is the first time I have looked forward to Christmas in years.
Yet, still, there is a niggling at the back of my mind. I know Warrick is still hiding something from me. I hate my female intuition but it won’t switch off.
He’s been out all day shopping. Last-minute dash, he said. In his absence, and with my own chores all done already in my haste to enjoy the season, I have had too much time to think. I’ve now worked myself up into a state, ready to face him.
When he comes in with sacks and sacks of stuff, I inwardly moan. I receive a hug and kiss and then he ventures upstairs to stow it all in the spare room.
He comes back down and warms his hands at our gas fire in the living room.
“Crazy out there, crazy. And sodding cold. You wouldn’t believe it.”
“I believe it.”
I watch him warming his fingers and decide there will never be a good moment. I know I won’t be able to spend the whole of Christmas keeping my mouth shut.
“Rick, we need to talk.”
He senses my tone because when his head whips back, I see a frightened gaze.
“What about?”
“Us.”
He stands and puts his hands in his pockets. “Listen, babes, I don’t know how many receipts I kept for that stuff upstairs. If you’re thinking about dumping me, you’d not only break my heart but you’d also leave me with a load of women’s stuff I can’t use!”
He stands hopping on his feet and I see the worry. He knew this was coming, however, he had to have known.
“Why won’t you set a date?” I beckon an answer to the thing most plaguing my worry.
“Because‒”
“I need to know,” I assert, for my sanity if nothing else. “Whenever I ask, you avoid. It’s really starting to physically hurt me and I want us to talk this thing out.”
“Sit down,” he says.
We do and I take his hand. “Tell me. Because the undercover thing is over, and we’re happy, aren’t we?”
“Yep, we’re happy.” He struggles to produce a smile and my heart shatters into a million pieces. There is something. I see it in his eyes.
“What is it then?” I am begging him now. I am so worried.
“Jules, I can’t marry you until I tell you something. There is something I lied about. I can’t marry you while there is a lie hanging over us.”
“Hanging over us?” I hold my hand at my heart and stand up. I can’t. What is he doing to me?
“Last Christmas, we weren’t talking. Because of my work. You told me it was over.”
“Yes.”
“I knew then I loved you more than Anna. More than my career, more than life. I had been in love with you since the first day we met.”
“And?” Spit it out!
“You told me to go, so I did.”
“Listen, Rick, I was scared. I‒I…”
“I know that now, and I’m so sorry. We were both idiots, just too in love to see straight.”
“What did you do?”
“I was a wreck for weeks after that. Thought I was going to have a breakdown. Anna came round one night. My dad must have called and asked her to because he was scared I was sliding back down the slippery slope again.”
“Anna?”
The realisation dawns. I can barely breathe. My heart stings. My stomach has disappeared into another dimension. I feel like my heart and soul have been ripped away and torn to pieces. My head is swimming.
I hear his next words like they’re not real.
“We didn’t sleep together. I promise you. I swear on Joe’s life. But we nearly did. I was drunk. She was still fighting with Jake.”
“You… kissed, got naked, what? What happened? Exactly just what happened?”
I feel sick. I can’t believe it. I don’t want to let myself. The images, the emotions, the whole scenario… I can’t breathe. I want to die.
“There’s no good can come of me running through all that‒”
“Tell me, so help me, tell me what happened!” I scream.
“We kissed, yeah, her top came off, so did mine!”
I hold my fists at each side of my cheek and I can’t even force myself to cry. This hurts more than I ever knew it would.
“What else?” My voice is low and threatening.
“I just knew it was wrong, but she kept on, kept trying to get me to succumb. I kept pulling away. She kept trying to kiss me.”
“She was forcing herself on you?”
That might be better, I can deal with that, but I might still want to destroy her.
“She was out of her mind too, drunk, upset, not thinking straight. It was terrible. She slapped me. Told me I had ruined her life.”
Warrick’s crying now. He’s blubbing.
“I remember thinking, I remember thinking… what if… what if… it had been me and you, then, when I was in that job? If you were her, back then, and you were married to me with a kid and you found out I had done those things, would you have stayed with me?”
I realise there is something worse than him kissing her with their tops off ‒ he’s still not gotten over the past. I am not sure he ever will. What he did as a detective goes against everything he is, as a person, in his real life.
I lean down and viciously spit, “You could have saved me the agony I am feeling right now. Back in May, you could have told me all this then! In fact, you might have not told me at all if you had an ounce of respect for me.”
“I have too much respect, that’s the problem. That and my love for you grows with each day we spend together.”
He holds his head in his hands and remains seated on the sofa while I wonder whether to hit him, or, leave and never come back.
“How can you ask me questions like that when I would have still been in teacher training when you were a copper. At that point in time I was battling the loneliness of my life!”
I yell and rip at my own hair. I feel like dying would be easier right now. I march to the patio doors and kick the glass. Truth is, I wouldn’t have been able to forgive him, if I had been Anna. I would have done the same as her. I know myself. It would hurt too much. I also know that it hurts like red pokers in my eyes to know he was kissing her while he was meant to be in love with me.
“I am so sorry, Jules, but this is how I feel. Divorce is a terrible thing. I can’t marry you unless you can forgive me. In the future, things may go wrong. We don’t know what will happen. I couldn’t face another failure, I think it would kill me. A part of me will always love Anna for the small chunk of happiness we shared, the son she gave me. You have to accept that, as hard as it is. But whatever is left of me is yours. I chose you, I will always choose you.”
I don’t know why he is trying to agitate me.
“What are you saying? Why can’t you give me a straight scenario here? Something I can pick my way through?”
“Okay, okay,” he says, shaking his head, still hiding his face in his hands. “I think you could do better, and I am not just saying that Jules. You could do better than me. You’re still learning about yourself, it’s clear. I think that if you had five minutes away, you wouldn’t miss me! You’d have some rich, talented, cool guy whip you off your feet and he’d not be tempted by his ex-wife even when he knows you’re the one.”
My mind floods with emotion. Particularly anger. Plus, a need to disconcert him like he has done me.
“Do you still fancy Anna, eh? Do you fancy her more than me? Do you want her again? Why don’t you just go to her, then?”
“I love you!” He stands and roars from his stomach, growling. “I fucking love you Julianne!” His shouts are hoarse and loaded with remorse, with aching regret.
Our bodies somehow crash together, meeting from opposing sides of the room, and within minutes we are panting on the flo
or, having made frantic love. I hate myself.
I go upstairs and lock the door on the bathroom. I run a bath and he doesn’t try to come in. I just hear him wrapping my presents like a madman in the spare room next door. Cursing over tape and scissors not obeying his commands. I cry my eyes out and I know, for a certainty, I can’t remove this sinking feeling from my stomach. He doesn’t want me to have the same regrets as him. He loves me that much. He’s my first love, so what do I know? Nothing much. I am limited in experience. He’s only the third man I ever slept with, the first man I ever lived with.
He had a whole other life before me, and what have I had…?
…pain, anguish, misery, self-doubt and a recent realisation of my possibilities.
Later, I get into bed and ask him not to touch me. I lay there for hours, staring at the wall. When I roll over to look at the clock on his bedside, it’s 3.13a.m.
Christmas Day.
“Can’t sleep, either?”
“Nope,” I reply.
“Mum always used to say if you can’t sleep, go for a walk. Clear your head. Get back in bed and it will all be alright.”
An hour or so later, we’ve walked miles. I am bundled up in so many layers I can barely tell if I am still me, or if he’s still him. I look like the proverbial snowman. I don’t know where we are. It’s all a blur. He spots a snicket beneath a railway bridge and gestures we take a gander.
We find ourselves on a small, abandoned train track that I recognise from my research of the city I fell in love with. All around us is fog and darkness. A few stars, a tiny moon and the scents of the bakery brewing up her morning batch, even on today of all days. It fills my lungs and I take it into my stomach, shutting my eyes to remember that smell. When I close off my sight, my other senses become more potent and I catch the metallic stench of pollution, of threatening snow and the salty estuary, which lies a way away but can still carry on the air with a high wind.
Without wind, there is only silence.
“This was where people used to leave this city. When they went off to the Americas. They took a train from right here, they waved to the family and friends they were leaving behind, never knowing whether they would ever see them again. Their journey to Liverpool and beyond started right here. Some never knew whether they would even survive the ocean. Some must have felt sure they were heading for fame and fortune.”
Angel Avenue Page 29
