While Hannah is still out here, I’m not going anywhere. She and Lorna may still need my support, so I ignore the detective’s suggestion and Parkfield’s jibes.
He turns back to Callaghan, smoothing his tie. ‘I’m the headmaster at St George’s, and Kirstie Rawlings is one of my teaching staff. She’s on maternity leave, but it seems she may have developed a few mental health issues—’
‘Let’s not start making unfounded accusations,’ Callaghan interjects.
‘Hannah!’ I turn to see Callum come racing over from the direction of the building site, followed by his dad.
Hannah turns at the sound of her name, but when she sees who it is, she shakes her head and turns back to her mum.
‘You okay, Hannah?’ Callum arrives out of breath, but his dad puts a hand on his shoulder and stops him coming any closer.
One of the uniformed officers steps forward to usher Callum and his dad away. ‘Please can you gentlemen give us some space. This doesn’t concern you.’ He turns to Martin. ‘You too, sir.’ Martin mumbles something apologetic and shuffles back to his front garden while Carson guides a reluctant Callum away, but they’re still hovering outside number six, watching.
Parkfield stares Detective Callaghan in the eye while pointing his finger at me. ‘This woman is the worst kind of troublemaker,’ he cries. ‘Kirstie Rawlings has accused my family of all kinds of things. She’s completely unhinged. You can’t trust a word she says. Just this weekend, she was blind drunk at a neighbour’s barbecue. So drunk that she fell over and dropped her baby. I’m surprised no one’s called social services. There were witnesses. You can ask anyone—’
‘Yes,’ Callaghan interrupts. ‘I’m glad you brought that up. We’ll also be questioning you regarding allegations of assault against Mrs Rawlings…’
‘What!’
‘…following an incident at the same event, where she claims her drink was tampered with at your request.’
‘Absolute rubbish!’ Parkfield cries, his face colouring. ‘Look,’ he continues, his newly plastered smile translating as a grimace, a sheen of sweat on his forehead. ‘Let me just go inside, have a shower and get changed, then I’ll happily come to the police station to set the record straight regarding what Mrs Rawlings has been up to.’ He glances at his watch. ‘Let’s say seven o’clock, yes?’ He takes a breath. ‘Okay. Thank you, Detective.’ He gives a short nod, turns away and begins walking back towards his front door.
Callaghan raises an eyebrow at her colleague. They overtake him and block his path. ‘Stephen Parkfield,’ Callaghan says, ‘I am arresting you on suspicion of rape and sexual activity with a child, and of assault with intent to cause grievous bodily harm. You do not have to say anything, but it may harm your defence if you do not mention when questioned something which you later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence.’
‘What are you talking about?’ he explodes. ‘I told you, it’s all nonsense. I’ll come and talk to you later. Surely you can give me a few hours! This is outrageous. Lorna, tell them!’
But Lorna has fallen silent.
Still protesting, Parkfield is handcuffed and led towards a police car, his face crimson with anger and embarrassment.
Hannah wanted to come out here to see her stepfather arrested, but I notice that she is now shaking uncontrollably. The shock is all too much. I put an arm around her and tell her how brave she is.
The detectives lead Parkfield, ashen-faced, to the marked car, guiding him into the back seat in full view of all the neighbours.
‘Are you okay, Hannah?’ I ask.
‘Yeah,’ she says, her voice shaky but clear. ‘I am now.’
Forty
Seven Months Later
The tea tray rattles in my hands as I head out into the garden. It’s the first day of the Easter holidays and it’s also the first warm day of the year. I went back to work in February, so life has been a bit of a whirlwind these past few months. Mel stands up and takes the tray from me, setting it down on the wooden patio table. I sanded and painted the table and chairs last weekend and I can’t stop admiring my handiwork.
Mel and I smoothed over our differences months ago. I decided that life was too fragile to hold grudges. Yes, she’s a little flaky and doesn’t always think before she acts, but I’m sure there are hundred things that irritate her about me too. That’s the thing about Mel and me – since we were kids we were always falling out over something or other, but we always make it up in the end. And Mel hasn’t been as lucky. I have a family support network. She lost hers when she was still a child.
Mel cleared up the Tamsin situation for me. Turns out Tamsin lied when she said Dom invited her to the barbecue. Apparently, Tamsin was at Mel’s place when the Cliffords popped round to invite Mel to their party, so they ended up inviting Tamsin along, too. Tamsin was just stirring things when she told me it was Dom who had invited her, trying to upset me – it worked.
I’m ashamed to say that I haven’t been able to resist a few peeks at Tamsin’s Facebook page over the past few months. I noticed that she’s training for a triathlon, and I wonder if she’s doing it to try to impress Dom. I know I shouldn’t even be looking at her page, but I can’t help myself. Her updated status says she’s “in a relationship”, but there are no photos or mentions of her new man.
‘That sun is just heaven,’ Mel says, smoothing her hair back, closing her eyes and turning her face skywards, looking for all the world like a 1950s movie star.
‘It’s about time the weather cheered up,’ Lorna adds, picking up the teapot. ‘It’s been a long old winter. Cal! Hannah! Are you having tea or a cold drink?’
‘Tea please!’ they call back. Callum and Hannah currently have their hands full. They’re on the lawn – not only are they keeping an eye on Leo, who is now at the crawling stage, they’re also running around after Daisy, who has just started toddling, as well as Mel’s two little ones. But there’s a lot of squealing and laughter, so I’m not too worried. Hannah doesn’t want anything more than friendship from Callum, but he is so besotted with her that he says he’ll be with her any way she wants. Lorna now thinks the world of the boy and has apologised many times for treating him so badly before the truth came out.
‘So,’ Lorna says, pouring the tea, ‘have you decided what you’re going to do about Dom yet?’
I screw up my nose and sit down, angling my chair so it faces the sun. ‘I don’t know. He’s fine at his mum and dad’s for now. I miss him, of course I do, but I can’t quite seem to forgive him for not believing me when it when it was all going wrong, you know?’
‘He misses you, Kirst,’ Mel says. ‘And he misses Daisy. He’s miserable without you and, you know, if you take him back you can hold this over his head for years. I mean, he owes you big time.’ She grins.
‘If I did take him back,’ I reply, ‘I’d want to put all this behind us. I wouldn’t use it against him, tempting as it sounds. Trouble is, I don’t know if I can put it behind us, which is why I can’t make up my mind what to do. And I don’t want to make the wrong decision because it would be a nightmare to take him back and then end up resenting him every day.’
Dom has tried his hardest to make it up to me – looking after Daisy whenever I ask (although I suspect it’s more his mum who’s doing the looking after) and ringing me every day to see how I am and checking whether I need anything. He also stopped taking the steroids and pulled out of his triathlon. He said it didn’t feel right to compete after everything that had happened. Said his heart wasn’t in it any more.
Something else occurs to me. ‘So, you’re in touch with Dom, then?’ I ask Mel.
‘Oh, yeah. It’s just, you know, he sometimes needs someone to talk to. That’s okay, isn’t it?’ She blows her fringe out of her eyes.