Hope's Vengeance (28 page)

Hope brought her hand to his face, stroking the overnight bristles lovingly. “I love you.”

He’d always rebuked love as a redundant emotion, but for the first time ever it surged. Hope was different, he’d never met anyone like her. He’d had thousands of women, young, old, white, black, fat, skinny. But Hope was the woman who made life worthwhile. It wasn’t planned, it came from nowhere. “Marry me?”

The darkness failed to conceal her gasp, her hand jumped from his face to her own. Thoughts spun around her head, questions, answers, worries. Eventually she found the best route. “What’s the problem between you and Penny?”

He recoiled, his hands leaving her body, clenching himself in defence. “She’s just a kid. She’s watched us play a few times, I think she’s got a teenage crush on me, I think that’s why she hates me and you dating.”

Hope contemplated the words, spinning them back and forth in her mind, reasoning, logic. And she accepted his truth. “Oh sweetheart, why didn’t you tell me before?”

He shifted, a light smile, relieved that his half-truth had worked. “I just didn’t want to upset you.” He shifted up onto an elbow, his free hand caressing her flawless skin. “Answer me, babe. Will you marry me?”

Her light tinkle echoed through the chilly room. “Maybe I will if you’ll help me out with something.” He dismissed the mystery of the comment, accepting the answer as a ‘yes’, and his hopeful body relaxed, the breaths soon coming regularly, wonderful dreams of the future flooding him as he drifted back to sleep.

Hope’s head rested in the crook of his arm, the touch of a smile fleeting her lips, and she waited patiently until she was certain he was in his own dreamland. She had one more statement to make before she could ease the tension in her shoulders and relax enough to sleep. Raising herself on one arm, a gentle movement so as not to wake him, Hope studied his handsome face in the sliver of moonlight that shone through the crack in the curtains. She had one condition to matrimony, the certainty and depth of his love for her would be proven if he carried out her wishes. A finger trailed softly along his jaw, tenderness in its’ touch, and she took a deep breath. “I want you to kill someone for me.”

What Do You Do With A Body?

The remains of the brandy, both in the glass and the bottle, were gone, and Griffin paced the kitchen, backwards, forwards, trying to come to terms with what he’d done. And trying to work out what to do with the body now he’d realised going to the police would be a mistake. Dorothy was heavy. A short woman, but portly. And her body was cumbersome: he knew, he’d already dragged her from the bed, her well-cushioned buttocks shaking the floor when they dropped.

Did he roll her in a carpet? Dump her in a bin, in a skip? Use acid to dissolve her? Bury her?

He took the handwritten letter from the side, the distinguished writing black against the pale paper, and read the words for a final time before screwing the page up, tossing it into the half-hearted fire. ‘Get rid of your wife and I’ll be yours.’ The words haunted him, he wanted Eva, but he already missed Dorothy. Would Eva cook him breakfast every morning like she had? Would she bring him cocoa in bed? Listen to the ideas for his sermons? Was this just about sex or was there more?

Hand clasping his forehead, he retraced his steps to the bedroom, wishing the body would be gone, solving his problems. But the lardy form was still slumped over the crinkled bedroom rug, as large in death as it had been in life. Griffin sat on his bed, legs up and crossed, relaxing against the pillow that cradled his worried brow. Regarding his wife for too many minutes, his eyelids tired, closing, opening, closing, until he reached for the switch and extinguished the bedside light. The answer would come to him in his sleep.

Interrogating the Other Side

Bern’s chunters were the only sound in the room, his hands whizzing trains along an imaginary carpet rail track. Hope was at the table, eyes puffy with lack of sleep, hair unkempt from tossing and turning throughout the early hours, and she played her toast from one hand to the other, hungry, but unable to force the calorific bread into her mouth. She threw it down on the plate.

Penny, lemon pyjamas stretching at the seams, gown tied loosely over her belly, slumped into the kitchen, yawning, and flopped into a chair, reaching for the steaming teapot. “Did he stay again last night?” Her tone was challenging, she’d been preparing for an argument since she awoke ten minutes before.

Hope sighed, the intrusion on her privacy resented. She’d suspected that Penny had guessed she was sneaking him in at night, and the statement confirmed this, there was no point continuing the charade. “I wish you’d just try and get on with him, especially now he’s asked me to marry him.”

Penny was standing instantly, shock across the tempestuous expression she’d forced momentarily before. “That’s disgusting!” Her outburst was unplanned, unchecked.

Hope smiled, she’d been after a reaction, and she knew no words were needed to enhance the blow, the news itself was enough. Penny had the fridge open, greedy fingers picking at leftovers, the food being swallowed before even registering a taste. Mouth stuffed, her voice was almost unintelligible. “Mum, he’s a womaniser, he’s well known for it, he shags everybody. Everybody.”

Hope raised an eyebrow, unprepared for the new slant. “I see.” After a few seconds of contemplative thought, she dragged the chair beside her from under the table, patting it welcomingly. “Okay. Tell me what you know about him. I can see there’s bad blood between you, tell me why you hate him so much.”

Penny lowered her full frame onto the edge of the seat, her demeanour uncomfortable, she picked at the peeling skin beside her nails. “I can’t, Mum. He’s just a womaniser, he charms the pants off all the girls. He must have slept with hundreds of girls.”

Hope’s expression remained matter-of-fact. “Maybe so, but he hadn’t met me before, and I’m different. When he says he loves me I know it’s true.”

Penny shook her head slowly, rising from the seat, and waved her hand, fingertip bleeding from the picking, irritated. “Have it your way, mother, just don’t say I didn’t warn you when he dumps you, or fucks someone else, or gives you some disease or summat.”

Ears grating from her daughter’s use of slang and obscenity, Hope wasn’t ready for the conversation to end, regardless that her daughter had already reached the kitchen door. “Penny, there’s more to it than that and you know it. Why can’t you just tell me the truth?”

Her defences came down instantly, Hope hadn’t thought it would be that easy. Tears began to prickle at the melancholy eyes, whatever secret Penny was retaining was a painful one. Hope’s maternal instinct swamped her, she got up and pulled her daughter close for a comforting hug. “Penny, I promise whatever it is, I won’t be angry. Has he tried it on with you or something? Is it something like that?”

Copious tears appeared from nowhere, her plump body racking with sobs, and Hope stroked Penny’s mousy hair, pulling her head tight into her shoulder, wetness soaking into her dressing gown. Eventually they subsided enough for her to reveal her terrible secret. “I had sex with him. Last year.”

Instantly Hope pulled away, eyes wide with shock. She was completely unprepared for the revelation, it had never even occurred to her that her daughter had lost her virginity, let alone to a man twenty years older. The paedophilic bastard. She grasped Penny’s shoulders, holding her upright, her grip firm but still tender. The words rattled tauntingly through her head, echoing back and forth, stabbing her heart every time they passed. Words wouldn’t come to either women, they faced each other, eyes locked, speechless. One woman full of revulsion, the other surging with shame.

After a moment too long, Penny shrugged from her mother’s grip, she slumped back into the wooden chair, sighing deeply, and could feel Hope’s flummoxed stare burning into her lowered head. She was going to have to explain herself, her disclosure had had a greater impact than she’d expected.

Penny’s eyes, a paler blue than her mother’s, yet just as stunning, implored Hope for understanding, while she searched for the words to begin the sordid story. “It was in the summer half term. Saz and Nessa said they were going to see Reveal at the youth club, them and some other girls I didn’t know. I wanted to go, but you said no.”

Hope was walking slowly towards the table, she sank, deflated, into a seat beside her daughter. Her quiet words were sour with guilt. “I remember, it was just after Lee had invited me to Rio, my head was all over the place.”

“Well, Saz, Nessa, the rest of the gang, they all teased me, calling me a baby ‘cos I couldn’t go, so eventually I told them you’d changed your mind, and that I’d meet them there.” The imploring eyes were back, shaming her mother. “I had to go, Mum, they were taking the piss so much, I couldn’t stand it any more.”

Hope nodded, she was finding every word painful, every sentence impacted her failing at motherhood. “Carry on Pen, I promised you I wouldn’t be angry, and I’m not. In fact I’m ashamed of myself, not you.”

“I told you I was going to bed early, said I had a headache or summat, and I climbed out the window, I tied an extension lead to my bed, lobbed it out the window, and slid down that. They gave me so much cred when I got there, it was worth it.”

Hope’s sombre eyes were studying the grain of the limed oak table, her stomach lurching at the thought of the danger her daughter had put herself in. Why had she said no, if she’d agreed, at least Penny would have had a safe lift there and back, and this would never have happened.

Penny swallowed, her throat dry. “Reveal were brilliant, it was the first band I ever saw…”

“You’ve seen more since?”

She nodded, her secret life now public and burgeoning. “I was totally into it, the noise, the atmosphere, and I thought the boys in Reveal were hot. After a while Saz managed to get someone to buy us some drinks, I had a couple of Bacardi and Cokes, and it gave me some confidence. I got up to the front, and Rick was even hotter close up, so when he started making eye contact with me, I flirted.” Penny was uncomfortable sharing her sex life with her mother, she shifted, grasping the edges of the chair with chubby nail-bitten fingers.

“When they stopped playing I hung around, and I couldn’t believe it when he came over, I thought he’d just think I was a geeky little kid. He bought me drinks, quite a few, and I was getting light-headed, and I was flattered that he, like, this hot guitarist in a big band, that he was interested in me.”

A sneer of distaste settled on Hope’s lips. “Bollocks to that, they’re just a two bit no-hope group, he’s no star.” The words were to herself, Penny momentarily forgotten as she mulled the dreadful behaviour of the man she had considered marrying just minutes before.

Penny jumped to her own defence. “He was a star to me, like, at least I thought he was.” Hope forced herself to keep quiet, to let her abused child continue. “When he suggested we go on to a party, me, Saz and Nessa, we jumped at the chance.”

Hope was incredulous at Rick’s behaviour, surely he could see they were just schoolgirls, and Penny could see the disgust. Briefly imploring once more, she stared down at the table, now trailing the grain herself. Her voice was timid, guilty. “We told him we were sixteen, told him we were leaving school this year.”

The uncomfortable silence hung once more, Bern’s cheerful engrossment in his games merely an unheard background noise. It drifted, neither women knowing what to say next, one woman an adult, the other a child. Another deep sigh, another shift on the seat. “It wasn’t really a party, we went back to Rick’s place, LeMan and Chaz came too. They gave us beer, whisky, and soon LeMan and Saz were snogging. Then LeMan got some more drinks, we were all giggly now, the booze had gone to our heads. He got a little plastic bag out of his pocket, it had some white tablets in it. He said they’d make us feel good. Sexy. So we all took one. He told us to take it with lots of beer because they didn’t taste so good.”

Hope’s day was ruined now, her plans a distant memory. “Do you know what the tablets were?”

“I didn’t at the time, but Saz told me a few months later they were Ecstasy.” The child-woman and adult woman shared a look of dismay, of conscience, of a new closeness now the secrets that had blighted their relationship for the past few months were out. “It did make me feel good, Mum. I felt happy. I felt sexy, and after a while I wanted him, I wanted more than a kiss, I wanted to go further, and he wasn’t about to say no. When Chaz and Saz disappeared into the spare bedroom, Rick looked at me, and I just wanted him. He took me to his bedroom, asked me if it was my first time. I said no, said I’d done it twice before, because I wanted him to think I was cool.”

“Was that a lie?” A silent prayer went to the God she didn’t believe in.

“Yes.”

“Thank God for that!”

A grating swallow, the memory painful. “We did it on the bed, it was horrid, it hurt, it made me bleed, and halfway through I wanted him to stop.”

Suddenly the sensible mother again. “Did he force you? Did he use a condom?”

Penny shook her head, and Hope’s face fell. “He didn’t force me. I asked him to use a condom, but he begged me not to, said he didn’t feel as much with one on, so we didn’t.” Their eyes met again. “Mum, I regret it, I really do. But at the time I thought he loved me, I thought we’d start dating. I thought he loved me.” The reality of his callousness twisted her face. “I didn’t think he’d just ignore me after, and it really upset me. He didn’t call, nothing. I’m more grown up now, I can see him for the bastard he is now. That’s why I don’t want you to marry him. He’s a bastard.”

The profanity no longer irritated the mother of the grown-up baby, she understood where the bitterness came from. That bastard had fucked her daughter. Then fucked her. A rage of hatred welled through her, she wanted revenge, for herself, for her child. Her voice was a whisper, full of pain, angry pain. “You must have only been twelve at the time.” Penny nodded, rueful. “That’s so illegal, you could report him to the police. I’d help you, I’d support you.”