Chapters (78)
- Title Page
- Dedication
- Prologue
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-One
- Twenty-Two
- Twenty-Three
- Twenty-Four
- Twenty-Five
- Twenty-Six
- Twenty-Seven
- Twenty-Eight
- Twenty-Nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-One
- Thirty-Two
- Thirty-Three
- Thirty-Four
- Thirty-Five
- Thirty-Six
- Thirty-Seven
- Thirty-Eight
- Thirty-Nine
- Forty
- Forty-One
- Forty-Two
- Forty-Three
- Forty-Four
- Forty-Five
- Forty-Six
- Forty-Seven
- Forty-Eight
- Forty-Nine
- Fifty
- Fifty-One
- Fifty-Two
- Fifty-Three
- Fifty-Four
- Fifty-Five
- Fifty-Six
- Fifty-Seven
- Fifty-Eight
- Fifty-Nine
- Sixty
- Sixty-One
- Sixty-Two
- Sixty-Three
- Sixty-Four
- Sixty-Five
- Sixty-Six
- Sixty-Seven
- Sixty-Eight
- Sixty-Nine
- Seventy
- Acknowledgments
- About the Author
- Remarkable Praise for Nicci French
- Also by Nicci French
- About the Publisher
“I’m okay. I’m back at work and that’s good. The media attention is dying down at last. I’m living with friends. You know, people ask me about what happened and I say that I got caught up in something. That’s not right, though. I chose to do Liam a favor. I chose to get involved with that household. Don’t tell me it wasn’t stupid.”
“I’m not going to.”
“And when I was eighteen, I let Liam derail his own life in order to protect mine. Now he’s dead and I’m a doctor.”
“He made a choice.”
“I made a choice as well.” Jude hesitated. She had one last question. She was almost scared to ask it. “Can I confess it? Give myself up?”
Leila looked at her for a few seconds, her head slightly to one side, her clear gray eyes quite sympathetic.
“It’s too late for that,” she said finally. “I’m afraid you’ll have to find some other way to atone.”
“How did Dermot know?”
Leila smiled.
“I thought you’d already asked your last question?”
“Just one more. How did he know?”
“How did he know what?”
“Liam knew, or thought he knew, that Danny would be there on the marshes at that time. But how did Dermot know that Liam would be there?”
“That’s simple. Liam told him.”
“Why?”
“He thought Dermot was on his side. He had no idea that Dermot loved Danny more than he loved him. A lot more.”
“It seems so—well, so wild to kill someone just because they’re going to leave them.”
Leila shook her head. “All I can say is that we live in different worlds, Jude. If you saw what I see week after week, you wouldn’t feel that. Men kill their wives because they say they feel nagged. There are several cases every year when men facing bankruptcy kill their entire family and then themselves, as if their partner and children are just an extension of themselves. I think that the Liam Birch who came to see you and ask you for a favor was a man at the end of his rope. He told Dermot that Danny was planning to leave him and take Alfie. What’s more, she was apparently going to fight for sole custody.”
“God, she must have hated him by the end. Surely that wouldn’t have happened.”
Leila shrugged. “Maybe not, but she cited his drinking, his bouts of anger and violence, his various affairs.”
“What a mess.”
“Liam’s business was going under, so he was looking at losing his house, which he had put his heart into, as well as his son who he adored. A man like that who feels that he has nothing left to lose can be very dangerous.”
Jude was silent for a few moments, thinking of the two brothers.