Risk of Harm

by Jane Renshaw

  ‘Your Da’s sakeless so he is. Travis, aye maybe he has his moments, eh, but there’s no malice in the boy.’

  ‘He broke my fucking arm!’

  ‘Bairns, eh? Yous were bairns. And Ryan’s always looked out for you. What for are you calling him a mentalist?’

  ‘He’s a fucking murderer!’

  ‘Keep it down, son! Aye, Ryan’s no angel, but Christ on a cheesy biscuit! No fucker’s ever messed with you cos they know if they do Ryan’s gonnae do them. He’s always looked out for this fucking family and that’s the thanks he gets?’

  ‘Aye, okay, maybe he looks out for us and that, but how’s Bekki gonnae react if she finds out he –’

  ‘She’s no gonnae find out.’ I go and shut the door. ‘Look, son. Right enough, it’s gonnae be hard on Bekki to begin with, aye, but I know what I’m doing here. She’s getting on fine with you and Carly and she loves wee Willow. I’m thinking tomorrow we can all go a wee trip to the zoo and Bekki can meet Mandy.’

  Connor’s got a right face on him.

  ‘Right enough, it’s best we wait till we’re in Spain before she meets the boys and Jed and the other bairns. Wait till the bitch is convicted and the adoption’s finalised and that. Get it all done and dusted –’

  ‘Aye, wait till we’ve a legal fucking hold on her and she’s in another fucking country where she cannae speak the language and she cannae run away to Edith’s or Mia’s or that. Aye Maw, that’ll be ace. Bekki’s gonnae be made up.’

  ‘I’m no saying it’s ideal, and aye, there’s maybe gonnae be tears, but long term, it’s for the best, aye?’

  Connor rolls his eyes and I’m in his face.

  ‘Get off my fucking case, son. We’re in this together for Bekki, right?’

  ‘Aye, whatever you say, Maw. Whatever you fucking say.’

  Six months later

  Chapter 35

  My dearest Beckie

  I’m so sorry

  She sat back in the chair. The view from her window was of the wall of the block opposite, against which a slender birch tree grew. She had watched the tree – she thought of it as ‘her’ tree – lose its leaves, she had watched it agitated by November gales and worried for it, she had watched the snow delicately ice its branches, and now little fat buds were swelling at the end of every twig.

  Beckie didn’t want this letter.

  She didn’t want any contact with Flora.

  And who could blame her?

  Yesterday the jury had returned their unanimous verdict that Flora was ‘Guilty’ of the charge of murdering her husband. And now it would be all over the press in every horrendous detail:

  Rachel Clark has killed again.

  Beckie was going to find out all about what Rachel had done.

  She scrunched up the letter and dropped it into the raffia waste paper basket.

  The contents of the room were designed to offer as few opportunities as possible for violence. So the bin was raffia, not metal or even wicker. There were no drawers in the desk she was sitting at, only open spaces for your things. Drawers, even the kind that were anchored in place, could be pulled out and used to clobber someone.

  ‘Flora, this fucking stinks. I’m that sorry.’

  She turned in the chair.

  Danielle was standing at the door, scratching at the side of her mouth where the skin was always dry.

  ‘Thanks, Danielle.’

  ‘Least you’re no getting transferred to some other fucking hole for the rest your sentence, though, eh? Least you get to stay wi’ us?’

  Flora smiled.

  Wendy appeared behind Danielle. ‘You’re gonnae appeal though, right?’

  Wendy favoured cut-off T-shirts that showcased her muscly arms. Today it was a neon-green number with the slogan ‘Blink if You Want Me’ emblazoned across it in silver text.

  Flora nodded. ‘Actually, Wendy, I was going to ask you something.’

  Most of the women didn’t talk much about what had brought them here. Some not at all, and that was respected. Flora had told Wendy and Danielle what had happened, in general terms, not naming any names because you never knew what connections people might have in this place. But now she was desperate.

  ‘Aye doll, go for it.’ Wendy swung herself up onto the top bunk, trainers swinging perilously close to Flora’s head.

  ‘You’re Glaswegian?’

  ‘Aye I’m a Weegie, can you no fucking tell?’

  Flora shifted her position in the chair. ‘I’m wondering if you know a family called the Johnsons. Jed and Lorraine are the parents, and the kids are Ryan, Travis, Carly and Connor. And Shannon-Rose –’

  ‘Aw fuck, Flora, you dinnae want to have nothing to do with they fuckers. They’re fucking animals.’

  ‘Well, yes, I know. They’re the ones who killed my husband and set me up for it. They’re Beckie’s biological family. Shannon-Rose is Beckie’s biological mother.’

  Wendy’s legs stopped swinging, and she whistled.

  ‘The thing is, they have alibis for the morning it happened – provided by the mechanics at a garage who say Ryan, Travis and Jed were there the whole day, apart from lunch in a café where the staff and customers also vouch for them and say Lorraine was there all morning.’

  ‘Aye, dinnae tell me, doll – Finnegan’s Garage on North Castle Street, and The Cup that Cheers down past the Haghill Cemetery?’

  Flora could only nod.

  Wendy snorted. ‘The Cup that Cheers – aye right, more like The Cup that’ll Gie You the Dry Boak. Fat cow runs the place’s about forty fucking stone with a leg ulcer on her you can smell from the fucking pavement? Never anyone in the place, but from the witness statements get read out in the High Fucking Court you’d think it was jumping every fucking day of the week.’

  ‘Do you... You wouldn’t be able to help me, would you? If you know anyone who could help break the alibis –’

  Wendy held up her hands. ‘Hold your horses, Flora. I’m thick as shite maybe but I’m no daft. I’m no going up against they fuckers, no way.’ She narrowed her eyes. ‘Christ. The fucking Johnsons?’

  ‘They found out that we were the couple who adopted Beckie, and they’ve been targeting us ever since.’

  ‘Fuck!’ Danielle was wide-eyed. ‘They topped your old man? Your pal that’s got Beckie, she’d better make sure they cannae find her, eh?’

  ‘Well, she’s moved house.’ Flora swallowed. ‘But I don’t think... The Johnsons can’t actually have wanted Beckie back. They could have snatched her easily any time. I think they’re just doing it out of... spite, I suppose.’

  Wendy was shaking her head. ‘Now you listen to me, doll, and you listen good. One hundred per cent, they’re wanting their lassie back. Aye maybe they could’ve snatched her, but Lorraine’s a smart fucking bitch, you know? What all she’s planning I havenae a scooby, but she’ll be planning some shite to get that lassie back, and getting your man out the way and you in the jail for it, that’s likely step one. You’d better be sure that lassie is somewhere Lorraine cannae get to her. I’m no joking, Flora, that bitch is smart.’

  Flora put a hand to her mouth as her stomach clenched and bile shot up the back of her throat. She pushed back the chair.

  ‘I need to make a phone call.’

  ‘Aye, you call your pal, wherever she’s at, tell her to skedaddle cos they fuckers’ll be after her, no question.’ Wendy sucked her teeth. ‘And Flora...?’

  Flora stopped, impatiently, at the door.

  ‘I can maybe no help you with the Johnsons, but there’s this ex-polisman Brian MacLeod, right, a PI, if you’re wanting polis evidence challenged, if you really didnae top your old man? Briefs use him for appeals and that. That wee girl Sienna Carmichael that was done for torching her ex’s gaff and him in it? She didnae do it, right, but she got convicted and her brief got Brian on the case and he found a witness heard this fucker mouthing off that he’d lit the gaff. And Brian gets hold of CCTV shows the fucker filling up a can wit
h petrol ten minutes before it happened? And his woman makes a statement that he came home that night with burns on his face and that. Sienna got off on appeal. I’ve got his number if you’re wanting it.’

  ‘Thanks Wendy. That would be great.’

  The phones in D Wing were in the next corridor along. Flora had to wait in the queue for an interminable ten minutes before she could snatch up the receiver, enter her pin number and dial Caroline’s mobile.

  ‘Hi, Flora.’

  ‘Oh God, Caroline, I’ve just been speaking to another prisoner who knows the Johnsons, and she’s saying they probably are going to try to take Beckie – you have to move, I’m sorry, but you really have to move away, somewhere they won’t find you... You can’t stay in Glasgow.’

  ‘Whoa, Flora, okay. If they were going to snatch Beckie, wouldn’t they have done it by now?’

  Flora breathed. ‘Yes, maybe, but... Caroline, I’ve been thinking... Unless there’s some sort of miracle with the appeal – and let’s face it, that’s not going to happen. The evidence against me is just too strong.’ She breathed again. ‘I’m going to be in here for at least ten years. Beckie – She’s cut herself off from me anyway. Even if I did get out... She’s happy with you.’

  She was pressing the receiver so hard against her ear it was aching. She concentrated on that as some detached part of her brain sent the words into her mouth: ‘I’d like you to adopt her.’

  ‘Oh, but Flora –’

  ‘I want you to adopt her and move away. As far away as possible.’

  Carly comes up the road pushing the buggy. Bekki’s dawdling behind, fucking adorable in her wee red puffer jacket. That snobby fucking school maybe can make the weans wear the school fucking skirt and jumper and tie, but I goes to Bekki in TKMaxx, I goes, ‘You get whatever jacket you want, Bekki, they can’t touch you for it.’

  I get back from the windae and point the remote at the TV, and I channel surf until I get Tracey Beaker, and then I fold up the Mirror and push it down behind one of the cushions on the settee, but with Flora’s face just keeking out, like I’ve tried to hide it, so I have, but in too much a fucking hurry.

  ‘Well then Bekki,’ I goes when they’re in the door, ‘how was school today?’

  She shrugs her wee shoulders.

  She’s been that depressed, poor wee soul, since the conviction. Sentencing was three days ago and the bitch got twelve year, but we’re making out to Bekki that it’s all fine, Flora’s gonnae appeal and she’ll be let go and then maybe she’ll come and get Bekki.

  ‘You wanting a juice and a bit of Battenberg? Or a wee piece of fruit? The fire’s on in the lounge, it’s all cosy in there and your programme’s on. In you go and relax, eh? What’re you wanting?’

  ‘Can I have Fanta?’

  ‘Course you can. Fanta and what all else?’

  ‘Crisps?’

  ‘Prawn cocktail or pickled onion?’

  ‘Pickled onion, please.’

  When Bekki’s in the lounge I goes to Carly: ‘Right you, get that Fanta and crisps.’ And I keek through the crack in the door. Bekki’s got her wee slippers off and her feet up on the settee. And now she’s pulling the cushion away and she’s got the Mirror out and I can hear the poor wee bairn going, ‘Oh!’

  And she’s reading all about it.

  And my heart’s breaking for her so it is.

  Now she’s got it open to where the story continues on page five, and here’s Carly with the Fanta and crisps. I grab them off of her. I leave it a bit and then I’m breezing in the lounge, all cheery.

  ‘Here you go, Bekster.’ And then I’m: ‘Oh, Bekki –’ And I’m putting the glass of Fanta and the crisps down on the coffee table and grabbing the paper off of her.

  Bekki’s jumping up from the settee. Her wee face is white as a ghost. ‘It says – it says Mum... There was this girl called Tricia Fisher that Mum was friends with when she was twelve, and Mum... Mum killed her. That’s not true, is it? She didn’t really kill Dad and she didn’t really kill that girl either.’

  I puff. ‘I’m sorry, Bekki. I never meant you to see that.’ I fold up the paper. The headline’s barry:

  Flora Parry was Child Killer

  It’s all coming out now, eh, they couldnae report on her previous conviction until the sentencing and that, but now it’s all over the fucking press.

  ‘It’s not true.’

  I get my arse on that settee and pull her down next me. I smooth her hair where it’s coming out the French braid. ‘Sweetheart... You’re going to have to be a really brave girl, okay? Because there’s some things I have to tell you.’

  Bekki’s no leaning in. She’s sitting there twisting the wee bracelet she got from Connor for her Christmas, made of lemurs all pulling each other’s stripy wee tails.

  ‘Flora... Last time I saw her, she told me.... I’m sorry sweetheart... Just remember that I’m always going to look after you, I love you to bits and nothing bad’s going to happen to you, okay?’

  She’s biting her lip.

  ‘I wish I didn’t have to tell you this, but... You have to know.’

  She’s nodding. The wee soldier.

  ‘Flora told me she killed Neil.’

  Bekki’s shaking her head. ‘No. That’s not true. Why would she say that?’

  ‘She didn’t mean to do it. She says they were arguing, and she just snapped.’

  Bekki’s going, ‘No.’

  I grab her hand. ‘Bekki, you’re going to have to be really brave... I wasn’t sure whether to tell you this or not but I think it’s important to know the truth, isn’t it?’

  She swallows and whispers: ‘Yes?’

  ‘They were arguing about you. Flora wanted to give you back to the Johnsons, and Neil didn’t.’

  Bekki doesnae say nothing. She doesnae look at me.

  I go to coory her but she pulls away.

  ‘I’m so sorry, Bekki. I didn’t believe it either when Flora told me, but the more I think about it... Well, the police are sure she killed him, and the jury were as well, and there had to be a motive, eh?’

  ‘But she didn’t kill him.’

  ‘Aw sweetheart. She’s been convicted, after all those smart people sifted through the evidence for months and months, you know? The justice system in this country, Bekki, the way it works, anyone who’s really innocent isn’t going to get convicted, or hardly ever.’

  ‘But sometimes.’

  ‘Aye,’ I puff, ‘but Flora told me she did it.’ I’m no gonnae lose it with the wean. It’s only natural, eh, that she’s in denial. ‘That appeal, sweetheart – that’s not going to work out. Flora’s going to be in that jail for ten years at least. You’re going be nineteen years old by the time she gets out of there, and Bekki, I’m not going to lie to you, I’m not confident she’s going to want to see you when she does get out. She kept going on about how you weren’t hers. How you weren’t her real daughter.’

  Bekki’s wee finger is stroking they lemurs.

  I coory her. ‘But don’t you worry, sweetheart, don’t you worry, because I’m here for you. I love you to bits. We all of us love you to bits. And there’s one good thing Flora said.’

  Bekki flicks her eyes at me.

  ‘She said I can adopt you if I want. And I’d be that made up if I could, sweetheart, if you could be part of this family that would be wonderful, wouldn’t it?’

  Bekki doesnae say nothing.

  I pat her wee leg. ‘You have your Fanta and crisps, eh, and watch your programme.’

  And then I leave her be. Comes round six o’clock, Connor’s back from his shift and he’s feeding wee Willow in her high chair in the kitchen, and Willow’s girning away and I cannae blame her, wee soul, Connor boils up carrot and sweet potato and that and purees it for the wean and it’s pure boggin’ so it is. And now here’s wee Bekki giving it, ‘On the internet it says there was this little boy called Nathan and his mum died and the mum’s best friend wanted to adopt him but they didn’t let her. The
y might not let you adopt me.’

  She’s standing there so straight, God love her, like she’s gonnae be a brave lassie, and she’s breaking my fucking heart.

  ‘Bekki, it’s okay, no one’s going to take you away from me. Now, I’m going tell you a secret, right, but it’s really important you don’t tell anyone, not Mia or Edith when you’re Skyping them, right, and not anyone else?’

  ‘Aw Christ Maw,’ goes Connor.

  ‘It’s okay son, it’s time. Right, Bekki?’

  She’s nodding.

  ‘My real name’s not Caroline Turnbull. It’s Lorraine Johnson, and I’m your nana.’ I can hardly get the fucking words out I’m that choked up. ‘I’m your grandma, sweetheart, and you’re our wee lassie that was lost, and now you’re back safe and sound, eh, and no one’s ever gonnae take you away again.’

  Bekki’s giving it rabbit in headlights. ‘But how can you be my grandma? How can you be? You’re not old.’

  I’ve got out a tissue and I’m wiping at my face. I give a wee chuckle. ‘Thanks Bekster, but I’m forty-two years old. Willow’s my wee granddaughter, eh? And so are you. I was young when I had my kids, right enough, but I’m your nana. Eh Connor?’

  ‘Aye, Bekki, Maw was just a lassie, fifteen year old, when she had your maw and R –’

  ‘That’s right,’ I goes before he can say it. It’s been hard enough for Bekki getting her wee head round Carly and Connor being my weans, and now she’s hearing I’m her nana? She doesnae need Ryan and Travis in the mix. No yet.

  Bekki takes in a massive breath and goes, ‘I want to go home. I want Mum.’

  Fucking hell.

  ‘Home, is it?’ I puff. ‘This is your home, sweetheart, and we’re your real family that loves you, right? Not Flora. Aye, it’s gonnae be weird at first, but you and me and Connor and Carly and wee Willow here, we’re going to have a magic time. But you can’t tell anyone about this, aye, especially not the social workers, or you’ll maybe get taken off of us and put in care like that wee boy Nathan, and kids in care get hurt. That’s a fact.’