“I’m sorry we lost Mike.”

Audrey spun round. Susan’s expression was nowhere near as sympathetic as her words.

“He was on a slippery slope, Audrey, and while I was trying to hold on to him, you were giving him a big old shove.”

Audrey’s mouth dropped open, but no words came out.

“He needed to look to the future and you . . . You couldn’t stop dragging him back into the past, could you?” Susan continued calmly. “You were so obsessed with Shirley, so focused on destroying Dolly Rawlins, that in your warped search for justice, you destroyed Mike as well. You did ‘something,’ Audrey, I know you did. You did ‘something’ and, from that moment, Mike had no chance. Losing his job, the drinking, the gambling, the aggression toward me . . . Oh yes, your boy put me in the hospital more than once.”

Audrey opened her mouth.

“Be quiet!” Susan snarled as she stepped closer to Audrey. “I don’t want to hear anything you have to say. My husband would be alive if his mother wasn’t such an almighty fuck-up. If he robbed that train to right a wrong that you started, I swear to God, I’ll see you banged up. Fuck the no-grassing code of honor, I will shout it from the rooftops!”

Tears rolled down through Audrey’s deeply wrinkled cheeks. Susan didn’t let up.

“Mike’s dead because of you. They’re all dead because of you. You’re poison. So don’t imagine for one second that I’ll allow you to do the same to your grandchildren, because I won’t. You’ve seen the last of them.”

As Susan walked off, Audrey remained frozen to the spot. The pain welled up inside her and flooded out in a stream of long-overdue tears—but even now, Audrey was crying for herself. The world was cruel, God had forsaken her, everyone was set against her; nothing was her fault.

Watching from behind the bike rack at the corner of the police station, Jack almost felt sorry for Audrey. He’d come across many people like her. She was one of life’s victims; it was all she knew. If she was ever honest enough to take responsibility for her own behavior, she would probably die from the shame.

Connie snored like a bulldozer on Angela’s sofa. Aggie and Riel giggled from the lounge door, pushing their palms tight over their ears in exaggerated pain. Angela sneaked past them and placed a fry-up on the coffee table, together with a cup of tea. The fabulous smell took about three seconds to wake Connie, who sat bolt upright, almost falling out of her pajama top as the buttons strained under the pressure of her breasts. Riel gawped at Connie’s cleavage for the length of time it took for Angela to usher them both out of the lounge.

“Teeth. Go!”

Angela stood by the window, looking out over her modest domain, and sipped her cup of tea.

“Don’t you wake up starving after a night on the booze?” Connie asked through a mouthful of bacon and fried egg.