Hanging Hill - Mo Hayder [67]
He held her gaze. He had still, clear green eyes. ‘Actually,’ he said, ‘I already am.’
Zoë stared at him. Something inside her was falling away. Dropping and dropping down into the floor. ‘What?’ she murmured. ‘What did you say?’
‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘But it’s true.’
She was motionless, absolutely speechless. The scars on her arms ached, made her want to rip her sleeves up, but she held herself steady. She wouldn’t let him know he’d poleaxed her.
‘OK,’ she managed to say. ‘Then I suppose it’s time I went.’
He nodded. The politeness, the openness of the nod, was the worst of it. This wasn’t hurting him at all.
‘But I’m right about Ralph,’ she said. ‘One hundred per cent right. He didn’t kill Lorne.’
‘Of course, Zoë.’ He turned his computer screen around and put on his glasses. ‘You’re always right.’
32
Sally called the NHS helpline. The woman she spoke to said Steve should go to his GP, but Steve had looked carefully at the wound and said that would be overreacting, that really it was just a hole in the skin, nothing more. Together they disinfected and bandaged it, cleared up the blood and put the nail gun, chisels and hacksaw into the boot of her car ready for the DIY on her house. After that they got on with lunch – eating the tuna, picking through a bowlful of mango and raspberry sorbet, drinking coffee, and loading the dishwasher shoulder to shoulder, all without alluding to the conversation about David Goldrab. As if they’d decided, in a curious telepathic manner, to pretend it hadn’t happened. It wasn’t that they were solemn either – in fact, they were light-hearted, making jokes about Steve’s wound going gangrenous. How would it be if he lost his arm and had to walk around like Nelson for the rest of his life? Sally wondered if she’d dreamed the whole thing. If shady, raw acts like contract killings really happened, or if she’d somehow misunderstood what Steve was saying.
She got a text from Millie, who said she was getting a lift home in Nial’s camper-van, and not to worry about coming to school, she’d see her at Peppercorn. She sounded happy, not nervous. Even so, Sally still made sure she was home by four thirty, waiting by the window in plenty of time to see Nial’s half-painted van trundling along the driveway. Peter was sitting on the back seat, shades on, one arm draped casually around Sophie’s shoulders. All of them were in summer school uniform, their hair gelled, spiked and decorated as much as they could get away with at Kingsmead. The van stopped and Millie got out without a word to the others. She slammed the door and strode up the path, her face like thunder.
‘What’s going on?’
She walked straight past Sally, down the corridor, into the bedroom and slammed the door. When Sally padded softly after her and listened, she could hear muffled sobbing coming from inside. As if Millie was crying into the pillow. She opened the door, tiptoed in and sat on the end of the bed, resting her hand on Millie’s ankle. ‘Millie?’
At first Sally thought she hadn’t heard. Then Millie sat up and threw herself at her mother, arms round her neck, head pressed against her chest, like a drowning victim. Sobbing as if her heart would break.
‘What on earth’s happened?’ Sally pushed her back so she could see her face. ‘Is it him? Jake? Did you see him?’
‘No,’ she sobbed. ‘No, Mum. I can’t handle it any more. Now he’s with Sophie of all people. She’s not even that pretty.’
‘Who’s not even that …?’ She thought about Sophie, with a dreamy look on her face in the back of the van, Peter’s arm around her. She remembered what Isabelle had said about Peter being in love with Lorne and how it had upset Millie. This was all about him. Half of her was bewildered that her daughter couldn’t see past Peter’s blond