Don't You Cry

by cass green

  Lucas felt uneasy as soon as they entered the room. It smelled strongly of cleaning products and was far too hot. The room had an oddly unused feel, like no one had ever slumped on the sofa and relaxed in here, despite all the comforts on offer. There was more evidence, too, of Quinn’s life than in the kitchen.

  He averted his eyes quickly from the large wedding photo on the sitting room mantelpiece, but there were other things too: copies of an Arabic journal underneath the coffee table, plus some artefacts and art. In fact, the framed Koranic script on the wall was something that had been hung for the first time in Lucas’s childhood home. It had been some kind of gift he’d received on his travels.

  Alice sank back onto the sofa and waved for Lucas to sit too. She didn’t speak. The clock in the hallway thunked the passing seconds with laboured significance.

  ‘He’s away for a couple of days,’ she said, ‘in case you were wondering.’ It brought the unspoken issue right into the room, which was a relief and also a surprise to Lucas. He waited for her to elaborate but she was quiet, staring downwards as she worried at a fingernail with her thumb. The room was so quiet he could hear the thwick-thwick sound this made.

  ‘Alice,’ said Lucas tentatively after a few moments had passed. ‘Has something happened?’ He took a breath. Had to handle this properly. ‘Are you … are you, hurt?’

  Alice’s head had snapped up at this and when she met Lucas’s eyes, her own were blurred and brimming.

  ‘I’m so selfish, Luke,’ she’d said in a small voice. ‘I have all this …’ she swept her arm around to encompass the house before going on, ‘… and I have Zach and I have Nick. But I’m still ungrateful.’

  Hearing her use this word – the very one Quinn had liked to lob into their faces like a rock whenever he was in one of his drunken rages – had the effect of shooting Lucas full of crackling, fizzing adrenaline. His breathing became shallow and he had to take a moment to steady his voice before replying.

  ‘Why would you say that?’ he said. ‘You’re not.’ Alice covered her face and started to cry, her narrow shoulders shaking.

  Lucas could hold back no longer. He’d been watching and waiting for five months now, trying to protect Alice from the side-lines. It was too much, seeing her like this.

  He found himself down on his knees in front of her, the wooden floor hard beneath him. She looked at him as he took hold of her hands, a hopeful look on her face. There was no surprise or wariness at all at his audacity, which spurred him on.

  ‘I have to tell you something,’ he’d said in a low voice. ‘And it might be hard to hear but I need you to understand that everything I’ve done has been for the best reasons.’

  Alice’s hands had jerked out of his. She looked a little scared now. But she had to know.

  So, Lucas told her that her husband had been his stepfather and that he had driven his mother to her grave. He told her that he had tried to put the past behind him, but when he learned about Nick’s return to Britain and marriage to Alice, he’d felt he had to find a way to warn her. The words tumbling out of his mouth felt so inadequate to the task required of them. How could he possibly make her understand? It had never gone down quite like this in his imagination.

  Alice had followed it all without speaking; her brow was furrowed, and her jaw kept clenching and unclenching as she studied his moving lips carefully.

  Finally, he had run out of words.

  There was a moment’s pause, an elastic feeling of time stretching between them, and then Alice had jumped to her feet in one swift movement.

  ‘So, what, you’re some sort of stalker, is that it?’ she said in a loud, quavering voice.

  Lucas clambered to his feet, more awkwardly, so he was standing opposite her.

  ‘No, no,’ he’d said desperately. ‘It’s not like that! I just wanted to make sure he wasn’t doing it again …’ he swallowed, ‘… the thing he does. And when I got to know you, I wanted that even more.’

  He was searching for what else to say when, in a clear, hard voice, Alice had said, ‘Who even are you? Is Luke your real name?’

  Lucas had made an anguished face, beseeching her to understand. ‘It’s close enough,’ he said. ‘My name is actually Lucas.’

  Alice had walked abruptly out of the room then and gone back to the kitchen. Uncertainly, Lucas had followed. She had her head down and was breathing hard, her chest rising and falling at speed as she pointed to the French windows.

  ‘Get out,’ she’d said. ‘Get out right now before I call the police on you.’

  ‘But Alice …’ he’d started to say, and she had screamed at him then, grabbing his arm and dragging him across the room.

  ‘Get out, get out!’

  He began to walk, as fast as he could in the opposite direction.

  He found a bench by the churchyard and sat down, sinking his head into his hands. His body felt as though it were made of lead.

  He couldn’t believe he’d played it so badly. What was he expecting? That Alice would greet his revelation with gratitude? He was an idiot. His sister would have told him that within minutes of him embarking on this enterprise, he was sure. If only he’d told her.

  When his phone beeped with a message he almost ignored it. He was too upset to deal with anyone. Then he saw Alice’s name on the display and his stomach twisted with hope.

  Please come back.

  That was all it said.

  Alice opened the door quickly. He came inside and enveloped her in his arms, without even thinking it through.

  She had clung to him, and Lucas had felt a sense of wonder at holding her. There was no thought of Zach at this moment, but all was quiet anyway.

  Then Alice was pulling him through to the sitting room and drawing his face down to hers.

  He started to say, ‘Alice, I don’t think we should …’ but he was overtaken by the feeling.

  Apart from some experimental teenage fumblings, it was his first time with a woman and, despite the strange otherness of this whole scenario, Lucas had felt a sense of wonder that female lips were really no different. The softness of her body was unfamiliar though after the harder male angles he was used to but he felt himself getting lost in her as they sank onto the sofa, tugging at clothes.

  Afterwards, they’d lain there in silence for a moment and then, in a quiet voice, Alice began to tell him what life had really been like in that house while Lucas watched and waited in the garden.

  There hadn’t been any physical violence, not yet. It was the psychological assaults that sounded so horribly familiar to Lucas. The small cruelties: ignoring her when she spoke to him; mocking her and saying she disgusted him; leaving evidence of having been with other women right under her nose. Telling her that she was useless, that her career was over. Even though they had a cleaner, he insisted on the house being kept in a constantly spotless condition and told her she was revolting if he saw any signs of baby sick or milk on her clothes. But when she said she would leave him, he’d looked her coolly in the eye and said he wouldn’t ever let her humiliate him. The implication of what he might do if she left seemed to linger like a bad smell, Alice said.

  Quinn hadn’t wanted a baby. He lacked any real affection for Zach, while constantly criticizing what he called Alice’s ‘lax’ mothering.

  She talked and talked, and that was when she made her request.

  ‘If something happens?’ she’d said. ‘I want you to get Zach out of here. I don’t care where you go. Just get him away. Do you promise?’ He’d felt the hot breath from her fierce words against his neck where she was still curled.

  He’d said only, ‘Nothing’s going to happen to you, Alice. Not while I’m here.’

  ‘No,’ she’d said. ‘I hope not. But I’m not sure I’ve got the strength to leave him, Luke … Lucas. He told me he’d always find me. Wherever I went.’

  ‘I’ll look after you,’ he’d said. ‘Both of you.’ He meant it. ‘I’m going to help you get away from him.’


  They had gone upstairs to the bedroom then and lain curled together on top of the bed, in silence. After a few moments, rain started to thrum against the bedroom window. It was very peaceful, lying there, although Lucas had to force himself not to think about Quinn being in this bed with Alice.

  Zach had been so quiet downstairs that Lucas had almost forgotten he was in the house. But now he started to cry with gusto. Alice sprung up from the bed.

  ‘Should I go?’ Lucas said uncertainly and made a move to get up, but Alice placed her hand on his leg.

  ‘Please,’ she said. ‘Stay with me. Stay the night. I don’t want to be alone.’

  Lucas sank back against the pillow and nodded.

  A little while later, Alice came upstairs with the baby; Zach was apparently in a milk stupor – eyes glassy – against her shoulder. She smiled at Lucas and laid the baby down in the cot at the end of the bed, then rocked it with her hand and made gentle soothing sounds. The baby quietly chuntered away and eventually went silent.

  Lucas lay with his head resting on his hand, watching her. He was feeling something strange and wonderful; a sense of stillness and peace entirely at odds with the situation he found himself in.

  When Alice came over to the bed, she took off the robe she had been wearing and slipped in beside him, a small smile on her lips.

  He never intended to sleep. He wouldn’t have thought it possible that either of them could, in the circumstances.

  But somehow, it was very late, and he was waking up to the most terrible sound of his life.

  The front door opening.

  ‘Alice?’ The sharp, clipped tone felt like a punch in the side of the head. ‘The trip’s been cancelled. I got as far as fucking Heathrow before the brainless publicist told me. Had a few drinks on the way home.’

  They had leapt to their feet, both yanking at clothes. Alice frantically began to pull on the robe on the floor, while Lucas tried to zip his flies with useless fingers. They looked at each other with expressions that might have been comedic in different circumstances. Circular mouths, circular eyes.

  Faster than seemed possible, Quinn was right there, in the room. In Lucas’s mind, the other man had always been a kind of giant. But now it seemed he really was still huge in real life, dominating the doorway with his frame.

  ‘What the fuck is happening here?’ he said, his voice low and quiet. Then, ‘Who is that?’ He came closer and his eyes widened. ‘Jesus fucking Christ! What’s that little shit doing in my house?’

  ‘Nick …’ Alice said, stumbling to her feet.

  Quinn didn’t respond, just roughly lifted the baby, and walked out of the room and down the stairs. Zach began to cry.

  Alice called, ‘Nick, what are you doing?’ and hurried after him, closely followed by Lucas.

  ‘I don’t think you’re a suitable person to be a mother,’ Quinn said. He put Zach into the carry cot – again, without much gentleness – and said, in an almost conversational tone, ‘God knows I never wanted him. I might just leave him somewhere at the side of the road. What would you think about that, hmm, Alice? Leave him for someone who can look after him properly?’

  ‘Stop it, Nick!’ Alice cried and rushed to Zach, but Quinn swatted her around the head and sent her flying onto the floor, as if she weighed as much as a rag doll. She crashed into the side of the cabinet and cried out in pain.

  Lucas was finding it hard to breathe. The time had finally come.

  He was no longer a little boy. He was a grown man of wiry strength. He launched himself at Quinn before he was able to pick up Zach.

  Alice was screaming. Zach was screaming.

  But Quinn had been so fast. Before Lucas had even been able to make contact, his arm was twisted, and then he was on the floor, ribs exploding with pain as he was repeatedly kicked, Quinn’s spit arcing and flying at him.

  He wanted to get up, go at him again, but Quinn was yelling that he was just like his ‘neurotic, useless mother’ and that he was so worthless and unlovable that she couldn’t even ‘be bothered to stay alive and mother him’. He kept on – ‘She didn’t love you enough, Lucas. You just weren’t good enough’ – and the words seemed to bloom in Lucas’s mind until they blotted everything out and something shattered inside him.

  He was ten years old again, a small boy frozen with terror, while the monster grew bigger and stronger and more furious above him. He couldn’t seem to make his limbs work as Quinn dragged him to the front door.

  ‘Now get the fuck out of my house, you useless little shit.’

  It felt like seconds later that he was staring at the closed front door.

  He heard shouting inside and then piercing, terrible screams. The sounds brought him back into himself and he was on his feet, hammering on the front door and yelling, ‘Alice! I’m coming! Let me in!’

  Silence inside now.

  He leaned his sore, hot face against the wood and moaned, banging uselessly on the door. When it suddenly opened, he almost fell inside.

  Quinn was right there, his eyes unfocused and his cheeks flushed. He pressed something hard into Lucas’s hands and it took Lucas a moment to understand what he was holding.

  A knife, smeared bright with blood.

  ‘She’s all yours,’ Quinn whispered and then he was gone. Lucas dropped the knife and stumbled into the house, shouting Alice’s name.

  He found her on the floor, her eyes open and already turning opaque as the blood spread around her.

  Lucas had stared down at Alice and began to shake.

  He knew he should call the police. But his fingerprints were on the knife. Who would believe the truth? He was the man Alice had called a stalker. Quinn was a national treasure, trusted by millions to be the calm voice of reason.

  He was going to end up being blamed for this, he knew it.

  But that wasn’t even what was killing him now. It was the fact that he didn’t save her, when he was right there; the younger, stronger, fitter man. He’d allowed himself to be thrown out of the house like a binbag of rubbish.

  His sister was right. He was weak and useless and now another woman he loved was dead.

  He couldn’t call the police. But there was one last thing he could do for Alice.

  54

  Nina

  It starts to rain as I make the journey back to Mirestone.

  I’ve chosen the worst time to do this; the beginning of rush hour. The dual carriageway is at a standstill and I drum my fingers impatiently, thinking about the window of time available for this mad enterprise. I crawl along with intolerable slowness. It’s only one junction and I should have tried to go by the back roads. But getting lost would be all I need right now.

  Finally, I’m able to pull off the dual carriage and take the turning that will eventually lead to the village.

  As I wind round the country road and into the village, it’s hard not to picture, once again, Lucas stumbling through the rain with Zach stuffed inside his coat like a bag of shopping. I look anxiously at the time on the dashboard. But it’s still ages until Sam gets home.

  The thought of him arriving back and me not being there is so dreadful I can’t even contemplate it. I know that I already have work to do, after the awful lie I was forced to tell when he wanted to come home that night. I still haven’t decided whether to tell him everything or not. I haven’t been named in the press but what if one of his mates somehow hears anyway and tells him first? No, I need to do it, but in my own time.

  When I pull up near the Quinn house, the rain is beating down like a tropical storm. I wait it out in the car for a while until the intensity lessens but I don’t have time to sit here for hours. Of course, I didn’t think to come with a coat or an umbrella. I’m just going to have to make a run for it and hope the bedraggled look might elicit some sympathy.

  There is no car in the driveway and relief is warm in my chest. Jennifer Sommerton had said Quinn was away and I doubt he would be here without a car, if he was in the country at all.<
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  There are no lights on inside despite the gloom of the rain, but it’s still only early evening. There is every chance no one is in at all. But that’s a risk I’m prepared to take. If Nooria isn’t here, I will draw a line under this and go home to wait for my son. I need to try though; just one last time.

  I press the doorbell, then bang the metal doorknocker, for good measure.

  Nothing happens, although I swear I hear some sort of movement inside.

  I knock again, harder, as rain forces its way down the back of my top and pools miserably there.

  The door opens a tiny bit and it takes me a second to look down and see the little girl peering out at me with big brown eyes and a thumb planted firmly in her mouth.

  There’s a burst of rapid-fire language I don’t understand, and the little girl looks behind her and runs off, leaving the door open like a gift.

  I don’t know what comes over me. I don’t even consciously decide to do it but, somehow, I am stepping right inside the house and closing the door behind me.

  Nooria appears at the end of the corridor, holding a tea towel. Her face goes from shock to fury in about one second.

  ‘What are you doing?’ she demands. Her English is very clear. ‘What do you mean by coming in without invitation?’

  I take a step back, so I’m almost leaning against the wood of the door, breathing heavily.

  ‘Nooria,’ I say, holding out a placatory hand, ‘I’m so sorry about this and I really hope I haven’t alarmed you in any way. I would never normally dream of just barging into someone’s home, but this is really important, don’t you see?’

  She says something in her own language, her tone disgusted, and then behind her the little girl appears, wailing suddenly and holding up a finger she has obviously injured in some way.

  Nooria shouts something I don’t understand but the meaning is clear. ‘What have you done?’ Then she goes back into the kitchen at the end of the hallway.