“See!” Connie added triumphantly. “Ester’s fault! Just like I said in the first place.”

Angela moved on to a happier memory. “Do you remember that guided tour we went on, Julia?”

“I was gutted not to be able to come on that!” Connie screeched.

Down the hall, Aggie stirred in her bed and mumbled, “Mummy.” Connie slammed her hand over her mouth but Angela just smiled. Aggie could sleep through a hurricane.

“I met you at the Dog and Gun, remember, for the ‘Murder and Mayhem Tour’?” Angela continued. “That young barman took us up to The Grange and started . . .” She couldn’t talk for laughing.

Julia took over. “He described us as five ‘wicked women,’ drawn together by a thirst for mayhem and murder. The outcome was inevitable, apparently—he even suggested that we got Dolly there specifically to kill her. He claimed our debauched orgies were eye-watering! Clearly he was getting the children’s home mixed up with Ester’s whorehouse. I was described as a drug-addled GP, Dolly was a murderess and I think everyone else was a prostitute. That right?”

Connie was outraged. “I was an escort, not a prostitute!”

“A classy, peroxide blonde escort in crotchless knickers, singing ‘boo boo be do’ up against an alley wall?” said Julia. “You were a prostitute, Connie, darling. And I was a drug-addled GP—but look at us now. Look at us now! Thousands of tourists traipsed through the grounds of The Grange listening to lies and exaggerations. We’re legends already—imagine if they knew the truth!”

“Twenty-four years,” Angela reflected. “Twenty-four years of pandering to Ester in fear of our freedom—of waiting for poor Norma to die. You’re right, Julia. Just look at us now!” Then she whispered, “Do you want to see it?”

The spare bedroom was locked from the outside. Inside, it was filled with all twenty-five of the seats from the bus Rob had bought from the auction two weeks earlier. The backs of the seats leaned against one wall and the cushions leaned against the opposite wall. In the far corner was a sheeted mound. Angela removed the sheet to reveal dozens and dozens of strong green garden waste bags.

Angela carefully untied the nearest bag, unrolled the top and opened it to expose the contents—£20 notes and £50 notes, thrown together with all the care and attention of raked leaves. These notes were “used” in the first place; now, they looked downright tatty. But to the women, they were breathtakingly beautiful.

This garden waste bag, along with the other forty-odd others, held their long-awaited, carefully nurtured dreams. Dreams that could have begun twenty-four years ago, had Ester not shot Dolly Rawlins dead in front of four police officers.

But now . . . Now it really was their time.

Chapter 21

The squad room was buzzing. Ridley wasn’t late—he was never late. He was with Superintendent Raeburn, waiting to find out if they had been given their “Consent to Exhume” from the coroner.

A low hum filled the room as DC Morgan took bets. An old fossil of a man, Morgan lived in the corner of the squad room, with his own mini fridge tucked away under his desk. He was allowed this because it contained his insulin; but it also contained cans of Coke and bars of chocolate. Morgan walked that fine line between hypo and hyper—and he didn’t give a shit. He was also the squad room bookie.