Claudia wondered if she should mention her mother’s hair and how much better it was starting to look. Although it was still patchy, there was no longer any baldness, and maybe soon they could cut the longer strands to the same length as the shorter ones.

No, she couldn’t go there, it was too connected to the way she looked.

In the end Claudia said, “I’m sorry, Mum, I know this is my fault. I just wish I knew how to make it up to you.”

Marcy’s eyes closed again and as she pulled her hand free, she said, “Have you seen Dan?”

Claudia’s heart contracted. Her mother regularly asked this question, and though she had seen Dan it wasn’t in the way Marcy meant. Others were always around, which she was thankful for in one way, but not in another, for she still hadn’t apologized for the way she’d turned on him when he’d told her he knew the truth about her. So much time had passed since that awful scene, and while she wouldn’t deny to herself that she wished she found it easier to talk to him, she wasn’t going to admit it to anyone else.

“You should see him,” Marcy told her. “You know he’s a good man.”

“You’re my only concern.”

Marcy didn’t argue, she rarely did, but Claudia didn’t doubt that she’d bring the subject up again tomorrow or the next day. It was a way of distracting herself from the awful reality that was her life now.

They fell silent for a while after that, until eventually Claudia got up to press a gentle kiss to her mother’s unspoiled cheek. Her eyes were closed, so maybe she was sleeping.

Marcy said, “It’s the fault of the person who did it, not yours.”

Claudia didn’t argue. “And I promise,” she said, “we’ll find him . . .”

“Don’t make promises you can’t keep.”

Claudia looked at her and felt so overwhelmed by her own helplessness, her need to do something that might in some way help her mother to return to who she really was, that she had to leave quickly before she broke into a sobbing rage of frustration and despair.

Chapter Thirty-One

“Andee, great you’re here,” Fliss declared, rushing over to greet her as soon as Andee came into the Seafront Café.

“I got here as soon as I could,” Andee told her, stuffing an umbrella into the stand and unraveling her scarf. “Is everything OK? It sounded urgent when you rang.”

“I think it is,” Fliss replied, and gestured for her to go through the café to the back. “There’s someone in the office you need to talk to.”