The Victim

by Kimberley Chambers

Mandy’s return immediately changed the subject.

  ‘How’s Babs? Did you see her?’ Frankie enquired.

  ‘Yep, she’s a bit sore, but doing just fine. Kelvin, she’s called her son, and he weighs ten pound. No wonder she was so big and in so much pain. She couldn’t believe that you had a little boy today as well. She said it’s a crazy coincidence and reckons it’s a sign that your babies will be just like you and her, best friends for life.’

  Happy that Frankie was now laughing rather than crying, Eddie stood up. ‘I’d better make a move now, darling. Poor Larry is shattered, he’s been up since four dealing with our latest drama and he’s gonna stay at mine tonight. I’ll come back and visit you tomorrow and bring Joey with me. And don’t forget what I told you, so keep your chin up, eh?’

  Frankie smiled. ‘I will, Dad, and thanks for everything. I know I don’t say this a lot, but I do love you, you know.’

  Feeling his eyes well up, Eddie walked towards the door before anybody noticed. His voice was gruff with emotion as he replied. ‘And I love you too, sweetheart.’

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  The following week was full of highs and lows for Frankie. The highs included the first days with her son, Babs returning to the prison with Kelvin and the date for her new bail hearing. The lows were the constant worry over Georgie and Harry’s whereabouts, the thought of life outside prison without Babs and the uncertainty over whether Jed was alive or dead.

  On the morning of her court case, Frankie was up with the larks, and started packing her worldly goods together. Part of her wondered if she was tempting fate by doing this, but Larry seemed so certain that she would get bail this time, that it seemed extremely lazy to leave the job for somebody else to do.

  Babs sat up, picked up her son and smiled as he clamped his mouth around her large, swollen breast. Kelvin’s father was the pervert who had raped her beautiful daughter, Matilda, and Babs had been worried that she wouldn’t bond with her son for that very reason. She couldn’t have been more wrong though, as the moment Kelvin had been placed in her arms, she had felt nothing but unconditional love for her child. He looked nothing like the dead monster that had helped create him, and Babs thanked God for that small mercy. Kelvin was very dark, considering his dad had been white. He was almost as black as she was.

  ‘Good morning, sweet child. I hope you gonna spare a thought for poor old Babs when you wake up in a nice cosy bed in some warm house tomorrow morning.’

  Checking that Brett was breathing OK while he was sleeping, Frankie sat on the edge of Babs’ bed. ‘If I do get out today, I ain’t ’arf gonna miss you, mate. I’m so glad you got your trial date through and I promise if I’m still on the outside, I will attend the court every day to support you.’

  Babs smiled. The thought of life inside prison without Frankie didn’t bear thinking of, but she didn’t want to dampen her friend’s spirits by telling her that. She was truly thrilled that her pal was more than likely going home and, hopefully, in four months’ time Babs would join her on the outside.

  ‘Why the ifs, Frankie? You goin’ home today and that’s where you deserve to be. As for me, don’t you dare worry that pretty head of yours. I’ll call you every day and that nice solicitor man, Larry, swears blind that now I’ve told the truth I will walk free. In four months’ time, sweet child, me and you can share that house with our children like we always dreamed about,’ Babs said brightly.

  ‘I am worried about going home though. Say Jed tries to kidnap Brett as well? I just wish I knew if the bastard was alive or dead. I’ll never be able to sleep at night until I have proof that he’s six feet under.’

  ‘I know that feeling. Even though I’m stuck in here, I can still smile ’cause I know Peter is dead and he can never hurt me and my children again. I’m really glad I killed him and even if I end up doin’ life, I’ll never regret what I did. A mother’s duty is to protect her children and that’s what I’ll tell the jury at my trial.’

  Frankie sat in silence as Babs winded her son and gently laid him in his cot. Something Larry had said to her was playing on her mind and when Babs hugged her, Frankie couldn’t stop herself from crying.

  ‘What’s the matter? You should be happy you finally goin’ home.’

  ‘I am, but Larry said that it’s better for my actual court case if we don’t find the O’Haras beforehand. How can I not look for my children, eh, Babs? I think about them every minute of every day. I wonder if they remember me and miss me. Do you think they’re being looked after OK?’

  As the sobs racked through Frankie’s body, Babs held her friend tightly. She wished she could promise Frankie that her children were OK, but she couldn’t make promises she didn’t know the answer to herself. It wasn’t right.

  Over in Essex, Stanley Smith was cursing under his breath as Joycie barked out yet another order. Not only had the idiotic woman dragged him out of bed at 6 a.m., but now she was giving him directions to a house he used to live in and was also telling him how he should drive.

  ‘Go a bit faster then, Stanley. We haven’t bought a top-of-the-range Jaguar XJ6 for you to pootle along as though you’re driving some poxy old Skoda.’

  ‘I’ve got a van in front of me, Joycie. I can’t bleedin’ overtake it; I can’t see what’s coming the other way.’

  Joycie tutted and glanced at her watch. Four times she’d made Stanley drive over to Rita and Hilda’s since they’d brought their new car home and four times her friends had been out, or pretended to be.

  ‘I bet they’re hiding behind the bastard curtains. They’ve always been jealous of me, Stanley,’ Joycie said suspiciously on their last visit.

  ‘Don’t be so bleedin’ daft. Rita and Hilda ain’t got a jealous bone in their bodies. They’re obviously just out, Joycie. People’s lives don’t revolve around you, you know,’ Stanley reassured her.

  Joyce smirked as Stanley turned into the road she and he had once lived in. It was only ten past seven and if Rita and Hilda had been avoiding her, then she would have the last laugh this morning.

  ‘You wait here, Stanley, while I go and fetch them. Then you can take us all for a nice drive somewhere pleasant.’

  About to say that seeing as they were in Upney, there was nowhere pleasant to drive to, Stanley clamped his mouth shut again. What Joycie wanted, Joycie got, so there was little point arguing with the deranged woman.

  Joyce strolled up Rita’s path first, banged on the door and, without waiting for an answer, did the same at Hilda’s.

  ‘Whatever’s the matter, Joycie?’ Rita shouted, looking out of her bedroom window. She had her hair in rollers and, even from a distance, Joyce could see she had a discoloured white dressing gown on.

  ‘What the hell’s going on?’ Hilda screeched, answering the front door in a pink nightdress and fluffy slippers.

  As proud as a peacock, Joycie pointed to her new car. ‘I’ve come to take you both for a ride in my new top-of-the-range Jaguar XJ6,’ she announced boastfully.

  ‘But you’ve just woken me up. What time is it?’ Hilda asked, bemused.

  ‘Just gone quarter-past seven, now, come on get yourselves ready. Stanley’s our chauffeur for the morning and he’ll drive us wherever we want to go,’ Joyce replied.

  ‘It’s gonna take me a good hour or so to get bathed and dressed. Do you want to come in and wait?’ Hilda asked dismally.

  ‘Nope. Stanley and I will wait in our new car. It smells lovely and fresh and the leather seats are just so comfortable,’ Joyce said, smiling.

  Hilda shut the front door, picked up her phone and dialled Rita’s number. ‘What a fucking liberty, waking us up this time in the morning just so she can show off a poxy new car. She’s off her head, that one.’

  Rita agreed. ‘She’s a bleedin’ nuisance, Hild. No wonder poor Stanley pissed off and left her that time, and why he would want to go back, I’ll never know.’

  Thanks to James Fitzgerald Smythe’s insistence, Frankie’s bail hearing was to take
place at ten o’clock at Snaresbrook Crown Court instead of Chelmsford. Eddie had chosen to travel to Snaresbrook alone with Larry so they could have a good old natter about stuff in private. Stuart had last week treated himself to a BMW and had offered to pick up Joey. Raymond, Gary and Ricky were travelling together and had arranged to collect Carol Cullen on the way.

  ‘I can’t believe the Old Bill haven’t released any more details. I mean, there should be something in the papers or on the news about the O’Haras’ disappearance now, surely,’ said Eddie.

  Larry shrugged. ‘All the police seem bothered about is finding out whose blood it was they found. Oh, that was one other thing I did find out. Somebody had thrown bleach all over the inside of the horse-box and the driveway to try and wash the blood away, apparently. Bar that, they don’t seem that bothered, Ed. In their eyes, Jed’s the kids’ father. It isn’t like they’ve been abducted by a stranger. You have to remember, they don’t know that it’s Jed that is no longer with us, do they?’

  ‘I think it’s fucking bollocks. I bet if it was someone else’s grandkids they’d get off their fat arses and find ’em. It’s because they’re mine they don’t wanna know, I’m telling ya. The filth have always hated me, Lal, you know that. They hated me father an’ all. I bet the bastards see this as some kind of payback for all the years me and the old man led ’em a merry dance, don’t you?’

  ‘I spoke to Fitzgerald Smythe again the other day. He has no doubt he will get Frankie off, whether the O’Haras are traced or not, but he did say it will make his job ten times easier if they aren’t found until after her trial. Perhaps this is something you should bear in mind if you are thinking of tracking them down. Frankie’s trial is looking likely to be in August, which is only five months away, isn’t it?’

  Eddie stared out of the window and took in the murky weather. How could he choose between his daughter and grandchildren’s well-being? It was a nigh-on impossible choice, but he knew that if he was forced to, he would put his daughter’s liberty above anyone else in the world.

  Frankie was barely listening as her legal team pleaded for her release. All she could think about was Brett being back at the prison without her and she just hoped that the staff were looking after him properly. Frankie had begged them to let Babs look after her son in her absence, but the prison staff said that it was against the rules.

  Wrapped up in her own little cocoon of worries, Frankie never heard the judge say the words, ‘Application for bail granted,’ and it wasn’t until her dad leaped out of his seat and punched the air that she realised that she was a free woman. Well, until her trial at least.

  Rita and Hilda were sitting side by side in the back of Joycie and Stanley’s new car. Both women were used to a bit of tediousness in their everyday lives, but as Joyce rambled on about the car’s fixtures and fittings yet again, Hilda and Rita glanced at one another in pure boredom.

  ‘We’re gonna have to be getting back now, Joycie. I’ve gotta take the cat to the vet at eleven and I’ve got tons of washing and ironing to do first,’ Rita said politely.

  ‘And I ain’t even had a chance to wash me bleedin’ fanny yet,’ Hilda whispered in Rita’s ear.

  ‘What’s so funny?’ Joyce asked in annoyance as both her friends burst out laughing.

  Joycie’s angry tone only made Rita and Hilda laugh all the more. Both suddenly saw the funny side of being woken at some unearthly hour, being forced to go for a drive, then having private lessons on the workings of a Jaguar XJ6.

  ‘I said, what are you bloody laughing at?’ Joycie asked, this time turning around in her seat.

  ‘We’re laughing at you, Joycie. I don’t think you realise how funny you are at times,’ Rita commented, holding her sides.

  ‘You’ve explained every detail of the car to us three times over and we still don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about,’ Hilda added, crippled with laughter.

  Furious that her friends were amused rather than impressed by her new car, Joyce punched her husband on the arm.

  ‘Ouch, that bleedin’ hurt. What was that for?’ Stanley asked, bewildered.

  ‘Turn the car around now, Stanley, and drive back to Upney. I refuse to be mocked by jealous, classless fools.’

  The words ‘jealous’ and ‘classless’ made Rita and Hilda both laugh all the more. The reason being, if they had to pick one woman in the world that those words summed up, then that woman would be Joycie.

  Thrilled to have now collected her baby from prison, Frankie was in reasonably good spirits on the journey back to Essex. Her dad had wanted her and Brett to stay at his cottage but, not ready to make friends with Gina just yet, Frankie had flatly refused and had opted to stay with Joey and Dominic instead.

  Eddie was on cloud nine as he sat in the back of Larry’s motor. He had one arm around Frankie and was stroking his grandson’s cheek with the other. ‘I wish you’d change your mind about staying with me, babe. You really will like Gina if you give her a chance and you won’t be bored with us oldies, ’cause Stuart’s still living with us an’ all.’

  ‘Thanks, Dad, but no thanks. I’d much rather stay with Joey for now, if you don’t mind. Perhaps when I get settled, we can go out for a meal or something and I can meet Gina properly. I feel so comfortable with Joey and Dom and I don’t fancy sharing your cottage with people I don’t even know.’

  ‘You’ll love Stuart. He’s a great lad and a real gentleman. He’s the sort of geezer you should have ended up with. He’s coming back to Joey’s for some grub, so I can introduce you to him properly.’

  Frankie looked at her father in horror. ‘Don’t you dare start all that! I’ve had enough of blokes to last me a lifetime, and all I’m bothered about from now on is my children. If you want to help me, then concentrate on finding Georgie and Harry for me, rather than finding me a husband.’

  Eddie chuckled. Frankie might have lost her liberty for a while and had temporarily lost her kids, but she hadn’t lost her spirit, bless her.

  ‘So who else is gonna be at this meal at Joey’s? You haven’t invited all and sundry, have you?’

  ‘Nope. There’s just me, you, Lal, Dom, Joey and Stuart. Gary, Ricky and Raymond ain’t coming back. The boys said they’ll take you out for lunch once you’re acclimatised to the outside world once again.’

  ‘What about Nan and Grandad?’ Frankie asked.

  ‘Joey didn’t want to tell them about your bail hearing just in case it all went tits-up. They don’t even know that Georgie and Harry are missing yet. Joyce rang me up to tell me she’d seen the Old Bill at the O’Haras’ house, but I played it down ’cause I didn’t wanna upset her. Joey thought it best to wait until you got out and then tell ’em. At least then he’d have some good news to tell ’em as well.’

  ‘I wish I knew if Jed was dead or not, Dad. I wouldn’t worry quite so much if I knew Alice was looking after the kids. Jed’s pure evil, no one knows that more than me and that’s why I’m so concerned for their safety,’ Frankie said, her eyes brimming with tears.

  Larry glanced at Eddie in his interior mirror. They locked eyes and Larry nodded his approval.

  Eddie moved his daughter’s hair out of her eyes. Now he had the OK from Larry, he could sort of tell her the truth. ‘Don’t cry, angel. I’m gonna tell you something now, but you mustn’t tell anyone, OK? Can you promise me that?’

  Frankie nodded.

  ‘Now I swear on my life this has nothing to do with me, but Larry heard through the grapevine that it was Jed that got killed and that’s why the O’Haras have bolted.’

  ‘How do you know?’ Frankie asked in shock.

  ‘A little birdie told Larry, but if you tell anyone, Frankie, you’ll get us all banged up, because Lal got the info off an insider, if you know what I mean?’ Eddie lied.

  Frankie sat in stunned silence. Images of Jed flashed through her mind. His piercing green eyes, the night they’d first made love, his proposal when he’d asked her to marry him.

 
‘Are you OK? You ain’t upset, are ya?’ Eddie asked her gently.

  Banishing the good memories from her mind, Frankie pictured her grandad Harry’s face. What goes around comes around, she thought silently. ‘I’m not upset. I hope Jed rots in hell,’ she replied bluntly.

  Larry and Eddie both breathed a sigh of relief. They’d been a bit worried as to how she might take the news. ‘We will find Georige and Harry very soon, Frankie,’ Larry promised.

  Frankie looked at her father for reassurance. ‘Do you honestly think we will, Dad?’

  ‘Has your old man ever promised you something and not delivered?’

  Frankie shook her head.

  ‘And has Larry ever broken his promises to ya? He promised you’d be coming home today, didn’t he?’

  When Frankie’s face suddenly lit up with a big grin, Eddie and Larry both chuckled.

  What neither man realised, as they jovially continued the rest of their journey, was that for the first time in their lives, they had both made a promise that neither would be able to keep.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  2001 – seven years later

  ‘Georgie, stop, no!’ Frankie cried, thrashing about under her quilt. Seconds later, she woke up crying.

  Desperate not to return to her nightmare, Frankie switched on the bedside lamp. Today would be Georgie’s thirteenth birthday and Frankie hadn’t been able to think of anything else all week. Was her daughter happy? What did she look like now? And, most importantly, where the bloody hell was she?

  It had been over seven years since Frankie had last seen either of her children. November 1993 to be exact. Harry would be eleven now, Georgie a teenager, and not knowing their whereabouts or being part of their lives had literally broken Frankie’s heart. Everybody had tried to find them for her. The police, the authorities, her solicitor, her dad, but to no avail. When the O’Haras had done a runner from Rainham, it was as though they had disappeared into thin air, and even a private detective her father had hired had drawn nothing but a blank.