Chapters (81)
- Cover
- About the Author
- 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
- Epilogue
- Acknowledgments
- Read More
- Prologue
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Follow Merilyn online
- Dedication
There is a sharp intake of breath from the barrister but I barely hear it. The room has grown too hot; it starts to sway and I grab the wooden edges of my chair to steady myself. Not blood, not blood from my child.
‘And the blood matches that of the defendant’s daughter?’ he continues.
I stare at him, then at my husband, then at my barrister. I turn to the jury. This can’t be allowed. This is not the truth; the truth is I loved my child – all my children. I stand and see my barrister stand too. She reaches towards me, gesturing to the guard beside me but I push them off. Words that have been like fists thundering against the wall of my head are finally released into the room and I shout:
‘I DID NOT KILL MY BABY.’
One
DS Nell Jackson looked up at the shabby white-fronted flats with her usual sense of déjà vu – after eight years with Thames Valley Police she felt she knew this stubby block of flats better than she knew her own. Even the fading light couldn’t hide white paint peeling from window frames, or the makeshift clothes lines spanning balconies like decorations on a Christmas tree while toddlers’ bicycles hung from walls in a desperate attempt to utilise what little outside space there was.
‘Morse, it is not.’ DC Paul Hare’s tone was flat and Nell didn’t bother to agree. Two weeks into a heatwave that smothered Oxford like a duvet, she saved her words for less obvious observations. Besides, she was long past being surprised by the city. At first, fresh out of Wales, she’d found it laughable drunks urinated in shop doorways on Friday nights past closing, when only the kebab vans remained open; that the homeless hung remnants of past lives in century-old doorways, grand pillars marking the boundary to that night’s home.
She’d soon learned that Oxford’s estates pumped out the same old crimes they had in Wales. Same problems, different view. So, Oxford for Nell was now not so much spires as shitholes. Populated not by worldly professors, but by people whose weekly income didn’t even match what some students spent on a night out – all existing under the watchful gaze of Oxford University, which managed the city in a way that would have put the Corleones to shame.
Unbuckling her seat belt, Nell nodded towards an open door on the second floor. ‘Best let’s go up then.’ Reluctantly tucking a dog-eared notebook in her back pocket, she prepared for a blast of late-night air and pushed open the door.
‘Are the parents still in situ?’ She slammed the car door and as the heat hit her she resisted the urge to take off her jacket. This wasn’t the type of case you went into half dressed.
Paul nodded. ‘Yep.’