‘My brain’s been all over the place since the accident. I can’t remember taking a gun to the Wilsons. I can’t remember driving back to the caravan park and trying to shoot myself in the barn. I can’t remember falling and banging my head. Since …’ she swallows, and Margot’s insides feel as though they’ve turned to ice as she wonders what her daughter is about to say next ‘… since it all happened I’ve been dreaming a lot. All these different thoughts have been racing through my head, fragments of memory. I’ve been trying to piece it all together …’ A tear falls from Heather’s eyes and drops onto her hand resting in her lap. Margot stares in horror at the teardrop, unable to move, to comfort.

Heather swipes at the tears. ‘I loved Flora. You have to believe me when I tell you that. I wanted to protect her. She was different from me. Flaky … dreamy. I never meant to hurt her …’

Margot puts her hand to her throat and fingers her gold locket, bracing herself for Heather’s next words.

Heather turns to stare at her mother and grasps her hand with such intensity that Margot almost pulls off the necklace. ‘Now I’ve got Ethan, I understand,’ she says. ‘I can imagine how you must feel. The pain of never knowing what happened. The torment. It’s not fair to you, Mum. I’m so sorry. I knew the body at Clive Wilson’s house couldn’t belong to Flora. I’m going to tell you what really happened to her, okay?’ She squeezes Margot’s hand. ‘And then you can decide what to do.’

Chapter 45

45

August 1994

The spell had been broken. Just like that.

They were walking in St James’s Park, admiring the pelicans. It had been romantic. The sun had been shining and she’d linked her arm through Dylan’s, like they were a proper couple. How grown-up she’d felt, how she’d enjoyed the admiring glances they’d received. Until Dylan went and ruined it.

Now he stood before her, in his tie-dye T-shirt and baggy jeans, his dark hair flopping into his bright blue eyes, and smiled the slow, lazy smile that used to turn her insides to mush. But not now. Now, instead of rushing up and throwing her arms around him, like she would have done earlier, or yesterday, the only desire she felt was the urge to punch him hard in his stupid, idiotic face.

‘What?’ he said, throwing his arms out. ‘What have I said?’