‘Do you have any idea who he might be?’ I ask her curiously.
‘No, I don’t.’ She reaches down to pat Mustard, a classic diversionary tactic if ever I saw one. With a start, I realise she does have a suspicion about who Limey Stan was. But rather than push her on it and risk her becoming defensive and clamming up completely, I opt for a different tack.
‘Whoever he was back then, he wasn’t an intruder,’ I say. ‘Why would Mum ask him to leave before the police came otherwise? If it had been a stranger, Mum would’ve wanted him caught. It must’ve been someone she had feelings for, because otherwise why protect him over me?’
The spots of colour on Lisa’s cheeks deepen a shade. Her gaze remains averted as she continues to pat the dog.
‘I think we should ask your mum,’ I plough on. ‘She was the closest person to mine, they told each other everything. She might have an inkling who it was.’
‘No! Leave her out of this.’
‘Why? If anyone can help me, it’s most likely her.’
‘Please, Cara, you can’t ask her.’
‘Why not?’
‘Just drop it.’
I throw back the covers and get out of bed. ‘No, I won’t. I’m going round there right now to ask her.’
I’d gone to bed fully dressed so all I need are my boots, which are downstairs. Determinedly, I make for the bedroom door, but Lisa stands in the way and blocks my path.
‘My mum doesn’t know anything and if you go round there now and say all this to her, she won’t react well.’
‘Why not? It proves it wasn’t me.’
‘She’s never going to believe us if we say Auntie Neet was behind this, you know she won’t.’
That gives me pause, because I know Lisa is right. Karen will always believe my mum over me. But something isn’t sitting right with me.
‘You’re protecting someone too, I can see it in your face,’ I state, to which Lisa flinches.
‘I’m not.’
‘Yes, you are, and if you don’t tell me what else you know, I’m going straight round to your mum’s house to ask her.’
Defeated, Lisa moves out of the doorway and sinks back down on the edge of the bed.
‘I don’t want this to be true, which is why I’ve never said a word about it to anyone.’ Every syllable is strained, forced from her lips with an almighty effort. ‘Cara, I’m scared my stepdad might be Limey Stan.’
Chapter Fifty-Six
Karen
Karen drops a raw potato into the saucepan already on the boil, then yelps as a splash of water rebounds and scalds the back of her hand.
‘How many times have I told you, put the potatoes in first, then pour the water on top,’ says Gary from his vantage point at the breakfast bar.
Ignoring him, she gives her skin a rub, but that makes it sting even more, so she goes over to the sink to run her hand under the cold tap.
‘One of these days you’ll listen to me,’ he grins.
Karen returns a forced smile. Her husband has been under her feet for most of the day and it’s getting on her nerves now. He says it’s a head cold keeping him off work, but she’s seen no sign of sniffles or sneezing and suspects he just fancied the day off. At least she hopes it’s that and it’s not him clashing with his boss and beginning to tire of the job again – this one has lasted longer than most and she couldn’t bear it if he began talk of handing his resignation in again.
The mince for the cottage pie she is making is simmering in a frying pan, along with some onion, celery, carrots and seasoned stock. She gives it a quick stir, turns the heat right down, then asks Gary to keep an eye on it.
‘I need to put some antiseptic cream on this burn,’ she says.
He doesn’t look up from the article he’s reading on his tablet.
As she roots around the bathroom cabinet for a tube of cream that hasn’t already been squeezed flat, her phone goes. It’s Tishk, back from visiting his family in the Midlands.
‘Hey, how was your trip?’ she asks, cradling the phone against her ear with her left hand as she continues rooting with her right.
‘Good, but I’m not ringing for a chat, Mrs J. I know you’re keeping your distance from her and I understand why, but something’s up with Cara and I don’t know who else to speak to.’
Karen stops rooting and perches on the edge of the bath. Her niece has been on her mind constantly since she saw all the lights on and the new-found worry that Anita’s true intention in leaving Cara the house was to this time punish her properly and have her locked up indefinitely hasn’t gone away. She’s even walked past the house a few times, hoping she might bump into Cara to see how she is.
Nervously, she listens as Tishk recounts being confronted by a group of strangers outside his house, led by that blogger Timothy Pitt, who claimed Cara attacked him after being frightened by another Limey Stan episode.
‘Pitt said Cara ran off somewhere without her shoes on and they didn’t know where she’d gone. One of the women got hold of Cara’s dog after he escaped when she left the front door open, so I took him back to my house. I dropped him round because I saw she was back, but she’s not alone – Lisa’s with her.’
‘My Lisa?’ says Karen, astonished.
‘Yes. She’s at the house with Cara now.’
‘What’s she doing there?’
‘I don’t know. She answered the door when I took the dog back, and when I said I was shocked to see her, she went all weird and shut the door on me.’ Tishk sounds peeved at Lisa’s refusal to engage with him, but Karen’s upset trumps his.
‘Why is Lisa at Cara’s and why didn’t she tell us she was down?’
‘I don’t know, you’ll have to ask her.’
‘How did she seem?’
‘Upset, actually. I think she’d been crying.’
Karen hangs up without another word and goes into her bedroom. She slips out of the comfy trousers she wears around the house, pulls on a pair of jeans, then goes downstairs. Gary hears her retrieving her coat from the cloakroom by the front door and comes into the hallway.
‘Where are you going?’ he asks, frowning.
‘I’ve got to nip out.’
‘Where to?’
Karen thinks quickly. She knows Gary will want to see Lisa too, but she wants to get to the bottom of why she’s at Cara’s first, because she’s pretty sure they’re not going to like the explanation. Better that she sees Lisa alone, then tells him.
‘Chemist. We haven’t got any cream and I think I’ve burned my hand quite badly. It’s starting to blister.’
She cups her uninjured hand over the other to hide the red mark that is actually fine and fading fast.
‘What about dinner?’
‘Turn the potatoes and the mince off and I’ll finish it when I get back. I won’t be long.’
‘But I’m hungry,’ he moans.
‘For God’s sake, have a biscuit or something,’ she snaps. ‘You won’t starve waiting an hour.’
She’s gone before he can respond.
Cara is not in the least bit perturbed to find her aunt standing on the doorstep. If anything, she appears pleased, which makes Karen feel conflicted because this is someone she is supposed to detest and yet part of her appreciates the warm welcome.
Lisa is in the front room, seated on the sofa clutching a balled-up tissue, her glasses removed and on the coffee table in front of her. Tishk was right about her being upset: the second she clocks Karen, she buries her face in her hands and begins to cry again. Alarmed, Karen goes straight over to her, shooting a look at Cara as she does in the hope she might offer an explanation as to what’s going on, but her niece has an oddly beatific expression on her face and says nothing as she waits by the fireplace.
‘Darling, whatever’s the matter?’ Karen asks Lisa. ‘Why are you here? Why didn’t you tell us you were visiting?’
‘Oh, Mum …’ Lisa says it as though her heart has splintered.
Holding her tig
ht, Karen’s panic mounts with every sob her daughter releases. She turns again to Cara.
‘What the hell’s going on? Is this your doing?’
‘No. I didn’t ask her to come, she just turned up.’
‘But why?’
Cara pauses for a moment, as though waiting for Lisa to start, but when it’s obvious her cousin is too upset to talk, she addresses Karen herself.
‘Do you remember Lisa trying to talk to you in the days after Matty died?’ she asks.
Karen stiffens at her nephew’s name being spoken by the person who, in her mind, lost the right to say it a long time ago.
‘She told you she knew something about Limey Stan and that she should tell the police, but you and Uncle Gary wouldn’t listen to her.’
Somewhere in the back of Karen’s mind, a distant bell clangs, but she shakes her head, unwilling to play along. ‘I don’t remember.’
‘Really? You don’t recall Lisa telling you she heard a man’s voice in the house that night which definitely wasn’t a ghost’s?’
Karen gapes at her. ‘What?’
Lisa wriggles out of her hold. ‘It’s true, Mum,’ she says, sitting up. She blows her nose noisily on her tissue. ‘I was here. I came round because I told Cara I would hide with her and Matty to catch Limey Stan. There was a man in the house that night, Mum, and I heard Auntie Neet talking to him.’
Karen swallows hard. She does recall Lisa saying something about a man being at the house, but she and Gary thought she was spinning them a line because she was upset about Cara getting into trouble and misguidedly believed it would help her.
‘I do remember,’ she says gently, ‘but there couldn’t have been anyone else in the house. Auntie Neet would’ve known and said something.’
Lisa shakes her head sadly. ‘There was, Mum. I wasn’t making it up. Do you also remember I asked to speak to the police who came to the house, but Dad wouldn’t let me?’
The vague memory of Lisa begging Gary to let her speak to the police sharpens in her mind. Instead, he sent her to her bedroom, out of the way.
‘You must’ve misheard,’ Karen says firmly. ‘Anita would have told the police and the rest of us if there was anyone else in the house.’ She glances warily at Cara, who still has the same, odd expression on her face, then turns back to Lisa. ‘I don’t know what Cara’s been saying, but we all know what happened that night and we know whose fault it was.’
‘That’s the thing, Mum, you don’t. It wasn’t Cara.’
‘Why are you saying this?’ says Karen, growing upset.
‘Cara deserves for the truth to come out. I heard what happened and I stupidly let all you grown-ups make me think I was imagining it, but now I can make sure everyone knows,’ says Lisa.
Karen angrily stabs her finger in Cara’s direction. ‘What nonsense have you been filling her head with? This is coming from you, I know it is.’
Cara looks wounded. ‘I haven’t said anything.’
‘Rubbish!’ Karen retorts. ‘My poor sister was destroyed because of you and now you’re back causing more trouble. When are you going to start owning up to what you did?’
Cara’s face crumples and, exasperated, Lisa shakes her head. ‘Cara isn’t making me say any of this.’ She grasps Karen’s hands between her own. ‘Look at me, Mum.’
Karen does so, properly for the first time in years, taking in every inch of her daughter’s face. When do we stop really looking at our children? she asks herself. As babies and toddlers, we drink them in, committing every eyelash, freckle and dimple to memory. When does that stop?
‘You need to hear this,’ Lisa adds. ‘For your own sake as much as mine and Cara’s.’
Finally, Karen nods. ‘Tell me.’
The two of them hold hands as Lisa describes her involvement on the night Matty died, what she heard coming from the front room and how Anita had kept quiet all those years about someone else being there. Karen sits rigid as she listens, but inside a storm has whipped up and it’s battering her heart against her ribcage, because she knows from her daughter’s expression that every word of what she’s saying is true. At the same time, aspects of Anita’s behaviour that had bothered Karen back then suddenly start to make sense – the shockingly damning statement she gave to the police, her refusal to visit Cara in hospital, abandoning her into the foster system against Paul’s wishes. Sending Cara away like that ensured Anita would never get found out.
Eventually, Lisa finishes, worn out with emotion. A devastated Karen lets go of her hands, her mind whirling with confusion. For so long she’s held on to the belief Cara was responsible for taking Matty’s life and now, all of a sudden, she’s expected to dismiss the notion? Then she catches the terrified look on Cara’s face as she waits for Karen to react and in that expression she glimpses the little girl she once was and the whirling suddenly stops, as though someone’s pulled a plug. Slowly, Karen gets to her feet, stiff from sitting still for so long, and crosses the room to Cara, who shrinks back from her as she approaches.
‘I am so sorry,’ Karen says, her voice cracking. ‘I blamed you and I shouldn’t have done. I had no idea about any of this. What your mum did to you is unforgiveable.’
‘You believe it wasn’t me?’ Cara whispers.
‘I do.’
Cara’s eyes fill with tears. Karen thinks about hugging her, but she can’t quite bring herself to step forward to close the gap between them and Cara remains equally rooted to the spot. They may never reach a level of familial closeness, but in that moment Karen vows to spend whatever life she has left making up for what was done to her niece.
She turns to Lisa. ‘I always knew Auntie Neet could be selfish and sneaky, but this?’ She breaks down before she can finish, the enormity of what her sister did sending shockwaves through her body. ‘How could she do such a despicable thing? She lied to me, to Paul … she tricked us all.’
Lisa stands up and holds her mum as she cries. Eventually, Karen’s tears begin to ease and she accepts the tissue Cara offers her.
‘I don’t think Auntie Neet tricked all of us, Mum,’ says Lisa.
Karen stares at her, bewildered. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘I think you’d better sit down again.’
Chapter Fifty-Seven
Cara
The three of us talk long into the night. Earlier, Karen excused herself from returning home by calling Gary and telling him the chemist had advised her to get the burn seen to at the local A & E. It was at least a three-hour waiting time, she informed him. He moaned a bit about his dinner and then said he wouldn’t wait up. I marvelled at how she kept her cool on the phone after what Lisa had told her about suspecting he could be Limey Stan.
‘It sounded like his voice,’ explained Lisa, when Karen demanded to know how she could possibly think such an awful thing of her dad, let alone say it aloud. ‘I don’t want it to be him, Mum, but I swear that’s what I heard.’
‘But why on earth would he have been sneaking around Anita’s house in the middle of the night?’ was Karen’s next reaction to Lisa’s bombshell. Then, as the implication of what that meant slowly dawned on her, she recoiled in horror. ‘No, absolutely not – they were not having an affair. I would’ve known. Gary’s many things, but a cheat isn’t one of them. Nor would Auntie Neet betray me like that.’
So Lisa shared another secret she’d been keeping back all these years.
‘I think something was going on, Mum,’ she said, looking pained. ‘I caught them outside during that New Year’s Eve party you threw when I was thirteen. They were at the bottom of the garden and Auntie Neet had her arms around Gary. From where I was standing, it looked like they were kissing. He got all flustered and said he was trying to warm her up because she was shivering, but it was obvious that’s not why they were hugging. That’s why I got so mad with him and stopped calling him Dad. I was so angry with him and Auntie Neet for going behind your back.’
Karen was devastated to hear Lisa’
s account but still refused to accept Gary was guilty of infidelity. She did admit my mum might’ve strayed though, her words laced with fury as she said it.
‘I knew she wasn’t happy with your dad and I suspected there were times when she was keen on other men, but my husband?’ she raged. ‘No, I don’t believe it’s true. Anita liked to flirt, but she didn’t have full-blown affairs.’ Then, when she’d calmed down, Karen told me a little of what my parents’ marriage was like. ‘Your dad was a generous man, but he treated your mum like a paid employee, expecting her to do all the housework and never lifting a finger to help. He spent so long on the road for work that sometimes I think he forgot this house wasn’t a hotel as well.’
That piqued my curiosity. ‘If Mum hated being a skivvy so much, why did she work as a housekeeper for other people?’
‘She left school with barely any qualifications and never trained in anything, so housekeeping was all she felt fit for, I suppose. She earned good money though, working for some very wealthy families. The last one had a huge house in a street off Middle Lane. It was like a palace.’
Then Karen had turned to Lisa. ‘You do realise what you’re accusing your dad of, don’t you? If you think it was his voice you heard and he was in this house that night, you’re saying he’s the one who …’ She broke off, distraught. She couldn’t bear to say it aloud.
Lisa had nodded miserably. ‘I know.’
Three hours later, exhausted from all the talking, I reach a decision. ‘There’s no point confronting Uncle Gary, because if he is guilty of pretending to be Limey Stan and killing Matty, he’ll deny everything,’ I say. ‘I need to catch him in the act if I want to prove it.’
Lisa nods in agreement, but Karen just looks desolate. I know I should probably be wary of her given how she’s treated me since I’ve been back in Heldean, but I am certain that after everything we’ve discussed this evening my aunt won’t go running to Gary to tell him we suspect him. What she’s been told tonight has hurt her immeasurably and despite her historic hostility towards me, I take no satisfaction in that. She’s promised she will go along with whatever plan I come up with, because if her husband has been pretending to be Limey Stan all this time, she wants him to pay for what he did back then and is doing to me now. Earlier, I told her how distressed I was after finding the table turned upside down and Matty’s toys on my bed and the writing on the mirror and she was horrified I’m being tormented again.
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