Jayden and Corey were talking to Goldie. She had known that he worked for them and she had expected that at some point she would have to see him again, but she had not realised it would be so soon. Catching her eye, he winked at her, a smile playing on his lips, so that she could see a sliver of golden tooth in his mouth. With their backs to her, Corey and Jayden paid her no mind.
Jessie shuddered and hurried out of sight into the kitchen. Jazz was doing the dishes, and she barely looked up when Jessie came in.
“Thought I’d better do the dishes,” Jazz said, offering a smile. “Get some of this mess cleared up from last night. It’s not like anyone else is going to do it.”
Jessie ignored the jibe and poured herself a glass of water. Jazz turned to her, flicking foam from her gloved fingers.
“You okay Jess?” she asked, voice full of concern. “I don’t want to pry, I know it’s not my place to, but if you ever need to talk, then I’m always here, you know –”
“Thanks,” Jessie said quickly, not in the mood for such a conversation. She doubted Jazz would be so forthcoming with the sympathy if she knew she’d cheated on her brother. She gulped down the water, poured another, and left the kitchen, leaving Jazz stood at the sink with a frustrated look on her face.
Jessie didn’t look into the lounge on her way back to the stairs, not wanting to see Goldie again. Upstairs, she closed the bedroom door and sat down on the bed. Seeing Goldie had brought the memories of last night crashing back again, and she tried to block them out, knowing even as she tried that nothing could make her forget.
* * *
Troy felt his hands shaking and clamped them between his legs as he sat in the waiting room, not wanting the officers either side of him to see his nerves, and hating the jingle of his handcuffs that betrayed his nervousness.
The jury was still deliberating, which meant a day spent in the waiting room adjacent to the courtroom. He had watched the clock tick, time dragging slower than he had ever known it to, until he could take no more and had resorted to blankly staring ahead of him at the white wall opposite.
One of the officers was reading a paperback, and the other was sat glumly, barely able to control his yawns, a coffee in his hand.
The door opened on the far side of the room, and Troy sat up straighter, expectant. The officers stirred.
It was Khan, all suited and ready for today. Troy eyed her a moment, wondering if he would give her a congratulatory fuck if he was found not guilty. She wasn’t half-bad, he decided, so she might be in luck.
“The jury has reached their verdict,” she said, her voice tight. “The judge is on his way. Five minutes.”
She gave a curtesy nod to Troy and left the room.
The officers seemed relieved that they wouldn’t have to wait around in this room all day, but Troy found himself anxious. This was the moment. They had reached a decision.
It was already decided, whether he was guilty or not. All that was left was for them to tell him, to tell the court, the world.
Troy, for the first time in a long time, found himself praying.
* * *
The courtroom was filling up and Aurora led her mum to the front row of the gallery. She wanted to be as close as possible to Troy, so she could see every frown, every tear, when he was found guilty of murder.
She tried not to think about the other possibility. If he was found not guilty, she could not even begin to think how she would cope. It was unfathomable. It was not possible. She couldn’t allow herself to think something like that.
Zoe joined her, dressed-up in the same clothes she had worn on the stand, and sat down beside them. She hugged Aurora, shooting a nervous glance at Marlena.
“Fingers crossed, eh?” she said, and Aurora smiled back at her, sensing Zoe’s nerves.
She caught sight of Troy’s mum and brother, looking anxious. They should be, she thought. Preparing themselves for the worst, she hoped.
Troy was led to the dock, handcuffs on his wrists, where they belonged, she thought. He did not look at her, but she stared at him, hoping he felt her anger burrowing into his skin like a disease.
“You’re shaking,” Marlena said quietly beside her. She clasped her hand. “Stop worrying. Justice will prevail, don’t worry girl.”
Aurora nodded, squeezing her mum’s hand.
She hoped her mum was right.
* * *
Tyrese slipped out of the courtroom doors and fumbled in his pocket for his phone as it vibrated. He pulled it out and answered, angered to be missing the trial.
“I got some news,” Sanjay said, his voice excited. “I thought you’d want to hear it, it’s about your sister.”
“Jessie?” Tyrese asked, surprised. He had asked Sanjay to look into what Troy was getting up to in prison, whether he had fucked things up or not. He didn’t understand what Jessie might have to do with any of that. “What do you mean?”
“Well, I’ve heard some rumours,” Sanjay said. “They ain’t getting shouted about, but it won’t be long before one of the Healy brothers hears them, for sure.”
“What rumours?” Tyrese demanded. “About my sister?”
“Yeah man,” Sanjay said, his voice uncertain now. “Thing is, the Healy brothers had some big party last night. One of my mates was there, and he said that your sister got wasted –”
“Who cares?” Tyrese snapped. “You called me for that? That’s hardly news.”
“She cheated on Corey,” Sanjay said.
Tyrese almost dropped his phone. He could hardly believe that Jessie would do something like that. She had betrayed her whole family because she loved Corey, he couldn’t imagine her throwing all that away for a quick drunken hook-up.
“You sure about this?” Tyrese asked, “Or is this just one of those rumours that’s actually a crock of shit?”
“It was with some guy called Goldie,” Sanjay replied. “Real name’s Sam, I think. Apparently the two of them went upstairs for a bit, into one of the bedrooms, and when he came back down, this Goldie was bragging to his mates about it.”
Tyrese gripped his phone tightly, his free hand clenching into a fist. He remembered Sam. He had shattered both his legs because he’d raped Brandy, back when she had been Troy’s girlfriend. The thought of Jessie spreading her legs for him was as frustrating as it was intriguing.
“You sure about this?” Tyrese asked, anxious.
“Yeah man,” Sanjay said. “And it’s only a matter of time before Corey hears.”
“Cheers man,” Tyrese said, hanging up.
He shoved his phone back into his pocket. He was pissed off that Jessie would lower herself by fucking such a guy, but it also presented Tyrese with an opportunity. He knew that Jessie loved Corey, and she would do anything to save her relationship. If he offered to silence Goldie, stop the rumours from reaching her precious boyfriend, then she’d be inclined to help him out, and Tyrese still wanted her to pass him information about the Healy brothers.
As he slipped back into the courtroom, he made a mental note to pay Jessie a visit, to make sure she knew that she didn’t really have any other options open to her. She could either prove her loyalty to her family by helping him out, or he would make sure that Corey knew the intimate details about how she’d fucked another man, and he knew which option Jessie would choose when he offered them to her.
* * *
Troy rose with the rest of the courtroom as the jury filed back in the room and took their seats in the benches. Though they were the ones who had decided his future, Troy had not paid them much attention before. He had been focused on Khan and her arguments, twisting his friends’ words against them to help his case. He had listened intently to the prosecutor too, offended as he was painted as a psychopath. Now he scrutinised the juror’s faces, hoping for a clue as to what they had decided.
No luck. Their expressions were blank, faces unreadable.
The judge greeted them and cleared his throat loudly.
The court r
oom was silent, almost as if nobody in the gallery dared to breath. Some of the jurors shifted uncomfortably, aware of all eyes turned to them.
“Will the foreman of the jury please stand?” the judge requested.
A small man with a bald patch stood up. He wore a light blue shirt that had probably been ironed fresh this morning. His tie was done up wrong, but he seemed not to notice. He swallowed hard as he stood, and Troy knew he was nervous. Probably sweating beneath that clean shirt, shaking on the inside.
The judge looked at him, as did everyone else in the room.
“Have you and your fellow jurors reached a verdict?” the judge asked.
“We have, your honour,” the foreman said, his voice shaking a little.
Troy found himself holding his breath, shifting forward to the edge of his seat.
“Excellent,” the judge murmured. He shuffled some papers in front of him, before lifting his eyes back to the foreman. “In the case of the murder of Shaniqua Curtis, how do you find the defendant, Troy Banks? Guilty or not guilty?”
Troy was almost shaking with apprehension. He was not breathing, not blinking, as he stared at the foreman’s mouth, waiting for the answer.
The whole courtroom was deathly silent.
The foreman took a deep breath, his hand shaking slightly, a bead of sweat appearing on his hairline, sliding down his forehead.
“Not guilty,” he replied.
There was a moment of stunned silence, and then the courtroom erupted.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
The verdict seemed to echo around the courtroom. Muttering erupted around the gallery, sharp intakes of breath replaced with whispers of surprise or relief. Keskia Banks let out a strangled sob and Trent threw an arm around her shoulders. Ms Khan shook the defence lawyer Rush’s hand, looking smug in victory as she glanced at the defeated, slumped shoulders of Lindhurst.
Aurora took in the scene around her as if she were in a dream. She heard her mother stifle a cry beside her, putting a shaking hand to her mouth, shaking with the shock. Aurora could hardly believe that after all of this, Troy was going to get away with it.
He had stolen Shaniqua from them, had taken her life and shown no remorse since, and yet the jury had lapped up Khan’s words and he would be a free man again.
Judge Harksaw called order to the courtroom, and the room fell quiet once more. He thanked the jury for their time. Aurora wanted to laugh. Why was he thanking them? They had caused this miscarriage of justice, and he was perhaps the worst of all, for overseeing such a circus. This was not how justice was supposed to work, Aurora thought, blinking hard to keep the tears away, not wanting to break down in front of all of these strangers.
The judge turned to the dock, to look directly at Troy now. Aurora took a deep breath and did the same, dreading what she would see. She was not disappointed. He wore a look of arrogant victory as he met the judge’s look, no longer abashed or afraid. He thought he had got away with it all, Aurora thought sadly, and then realised that he was right. He had just gotten away with it.
“Troy Banks, you have been found not guilty by a jury of your peers,” Judge Harksaw acknowledged. He wore no trace of a smile, his expression impartial as ever. Troy smiled at his words. “You will now be processed out of the system, after which you are free to go.”
Aurora felt sick at his words. The judge dismissed the jury. They looked relieved that the case was over. Aurora envied them that, hardly noticing the scrape of chairs and the eruption of chattering once more as the judge left the court.
She watched Troy rise to his feet and walk from the court with the officer who accompanied him. He no longer wore hand cuffs at his wrists, and Aurora wanted to run after him, to hurt him like he had heard Shaniqua, but she did not move. She could not even bring herself to stand.
“Come on,” Marlena said beside her, her clasping her hand in hers. “Aurora, let’s go home. We did what we could.”
Aurora stood up, willing herself not to cry. She followed her mother through the crowds of people. Stares and whispers followed them through the court house and out onto the street. Perhaps they wanted a display of grief, a wail of despair at the verdict.
She would not give them that, Aurora willed herself, trying to stay strong. The urge to cry, to crumple, was stronger as she blinked hard in the sunlight, but Marlena squeezed her hand. Aurora tried to clear her mind, to ignore the small group of cameras and reporters nearby, as her mother hailed down a taxi and ushered her out of the spotlight.
Justice had failed, Aurora thought. All her strength, ever since Shaniqua’s death, had hinged upon her killer being sent to prison for a long time, Aurora realised then. Now her strength, her resolve, splintered into thousands of pieces and she did not know how she would cope, or if she even wanted to.
* * *
Troy followed the court clerk into the antechamber beside the courtroom, his hands swinging free at his sides. No handcuffs now. He was a free man, he thought, hardly able to believe what had just happened. After months of worrying, he was free, he would not have to go back to prison again, could do whatever the hell he wanted and there was nothing anyone could do to stop him.
The officer who had accompanied him traipsed after him. Troy wanted to wave him off, tell him to do one, but he knew that the man probably had to process him out of the system. Since he was a kid, he had watched his brothers and their mates go through a similar process many times.
He felt his mood sour when he thought of his brothers. Tyrese, Trent and his mother had been there, he had seen them, heard his mother’s relieved cry when the verdict had been read out. His brothers had not cheered though, had hardly reacted at all, and that rankled with him. Did they not care? He wondered, not for the first time.
The door to the antechamber opened and Ms Khan came in, followed by a few men in suits, and the old, greying lawyer who had visited him in prison. Troy was not sure what to say to them. They had got him out of here, had secured his freedom.
“I just came to say congratulations,” Ms Khan said. She smiled at him, but it did not reach her eyes. She did not offer out a hand to shake. “We did it.” The suits around her beamed, looking pleased for themselves. Ms Khan looked at him squarely, lips pursing. “Stay out of trouble, Mr Banks.”
Troy watched as they all filed out of the room again. They were probably going out to celebrate the victory. He felt some of his pride diminish at her words, at the way she had looked at him. Perhaps she believed he was guilty, he thought. It was just a job to her, he realised, whilst to him it was his whole life.
He shook the thoughts from his head. This was no time to be negative, to let some stuck-up bitch like Khan get to him.
The clerk began to explain how he would be processed out of the system, that it shouldn’t take too long. Troy tuned him out, bored already of listening to him.
All he could think about now was how sweet his freedom would taste when he walked out the doors to the court house and stepped onto the street a free man.
* * *
Keskia Banks let her sons lead her to a seat in the corridor, a short distance away from the muttering crowd that had erupted from the doors to the courtroom. She did not look over, did not want to see if people were pleased or angered by the verdict. Tyrese made his excuses and slipped away, but Keskia barely noticed. Trent called after him, but he was gone.
“He probably just needs to clear his head,” she said, putting a placatory hand to Trent’s arm. Trent gritted his teeth, but nodded.
Keskia could understand. She did not know how to feel about it herself. Troy was her youngest son, and she did not want him to spend the rest of his life behind bars, had wanted him to be free, to have a second chance. Yet the looks on the faces of Shaniqua’s mother and sister just moments ago had made her question whether perhaps her son did deserve prison, if justice did need to be done.
Trent came back with a hot drink from the vending machine and slid it into her hands. He glanced up and down the corri
dor, looking on edge as always at the court house.
“He’ll be getting processed out now,” Trent said to her, as if she were new to the process. Her sons, all three of them, had been in enough scrapes with the law for Keskia to be used to by now. Trent checked his watch. “Perhaps I should find that fancy lawyer of his, find out how long it’s going to take.”
Keskia nodded, taking a sip of her sweet tea.
“I should give Jessie a ring,” she said. “She’ll want to know that Troy’s coming home.”
“You think she gives a shit?” Trent asked, snorting. “She’d be here if she did.”
Keskia thought about the truth of those words. She began to wonder why she was here. She loved her son, but did she really want him to come home? Things had changed so much now. He was not the sweet, innocent boy in his school uniform, shirt untucked and tie loosened, that she kept imagining him to be.
If prison had not changed Troy, then becoming a killer certainly had. She almost did not recognize him up in the dock. She did not know whether she wanted to any more.
She rose to her feet, clutching her purse to her chest.
“We should go home,” she said, and Trent turned in surprise.
“Yeah, once we have Troy, then -”
“No,” Keskia said. “I don’t want to wait for him.”
Trent looked nonplussed.
“What? Mum, you don’t mean that. Once he’s processed out, then -”
Keskia shook her head. Perhaps Jessie and Tyrese had seen something in Troy that she had not, and that was why they were keeping their distance. Deep down, she must have sensed it too, Keskia realised. She had never visited her son, never written to him. She wondered if she was a bad mother, knew that she must be.
“I’m going outside and getting a taxi,” she said. “You can stay here, or you can come with me. Either way, I don’t want Troy coming home.”
“What?” Trent remarked. “This is crazy. What’s he going to think?”
Keskia turned her back on him and walked towards the main atrium, discarding her lukewarm tea in a bin on her way. She heard Trent’s trainers scuffing the carpet behind her, knew that his loyalty to his brother did not extend as far as paying for his own cab fare.
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