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“That was a seriously underhand move,” Dominic said politely. Privately he thought the man sounded a real bastard.


“He said that he’d received several death threats from the men in the village after he’d gotten close to an older man whose wife lived in the States. He said he got a lucky escape when he came to London. I think he did try to make the marriage work. He was a great father.” Chantelle was surprised to find herself smiling fondly in remembrance—usually thoughts of her father triggered memories of the harrowing times they had endured after he’d left them abruptly to follow his heart’s desires. “He worked at the local barber shop and used to braid our hair. We had the best cornrow styles for miles. He was a good cook, too—much better than Mum—and each night he used to tell us funny stories about growing up in Jamaica.”


Chantelle paused, looking pensive for several moment. Dominic didn’t attempt to break the silence.


“I don’t blame him for marrying Mum. From what I’ve heard there was a lack of tolerance for homosexuals in Jamaica at the time…even now it’s not really accepted. He probably did have a lucky escape. But I can never forgive him for leaving without saying goodbye.”


“He didn’t call for seven years?” Dominic confirmed.


“No. He said he was too embarrassed at first and then it got harder and harder to pick up the phone.”


“But did you know that he was alive?” That was the part that would have torn Dominic up—the not knowing if his father was dead or alive.


“Oh, we knew he was alive.”


Chantelle’s answer was laced with hurt and Dominic suddenly realized that the knowledge could probably be as bad as the not knowing. Her father had deliberately ignored her and her siblings and his responsibility to them.


“When he first disappeared Mum was convinced that someone had murdered him. She was furious with the police for not taking the necessary action. But, apparently they had managed to contact my father as soon as she’d reported him missing. He had switched off his phone but not taken out the SIM card—the police can still contact you when you do that—they knew he was alive. They weren’t legally bound to let Mum know. It was only when Paul, my father’s young boyfriend, called his parents weeks later to tell them that he was in Leicester with Dad that Mum found out the truth. I think she’d begun to wonder if he was with another woman when his body wasn’t found, but she hadn’t been prepared for the news that he’d left her for a man…someone who had grown up close to our family. She had a nervous breakdown, I think. She started drinking heavily. The hospital fired her because she didn’t turn up for work or report sick. We ended up living on benefits.


“It was fun for the first week or two. Mum didn’t cook and we had Chicken & Chips practically everyday. But one day a social worker visited and found the house in a mess. Dishes piled high in the sink, the bathroom filthy, our bed sheets hadn’t been changed in weeks and almost every piece of clothing we owned dirty. By then we had begun sniffing clothes to see which ones could be worn again. Mum had sent us to play in the back garden when the social worker had arrived, but I came back in to get us ice lollies and heard the woman say that she would have us put in foster care if she returned and found the house in the same condition the following week. Mum told her to ‘f-off’, that we were her children and no one could take us from her.


“I felt proud of Mum for standing up for us, but when I realized she didn’t intend to tidy up or stop drinking, I started to clean up myself. I had no idea what to do at first—she and Dad had spoiled us. I’d never done any housework—but by the time the woman visited again I had the place in some sort of order.”


“You said this has been going on for ten years?” Dominic asked her quietly. He couldn’t imagine a mother not looking after her children properly. His mother would still fuss over him if he gave her a chance.


“Almost eleven now,” Chantelle confirmed. “At least she doesn’t go drinking at the local pub anymore. We used to get worried when she staggered home alone. Though that was better than when she staggered home with some strange man. She sobered up a bit when she got pregnant with Charmine, but went back to her ‘bottle of vodka a day’ before Charmine was one. If she knows who my sister’s father is, she’s not telling.”


“Didn’t you have any relatives who could have helped you?” he asked, reaching across and gently pushing a few strands of her Sisterlocks behind her ear to get an unobstructed view of her profile. He couldn’t resist stroking the soft skin of her jaw line before pulling his hand back and allowing her to concentrate on her driving.


“Everyone’s in Jamaica. My grandparents want Mum to go back home. She wants to go back too, but her brother renovated the house my grandparents lived in and added a couple of bedrooms upstairs. Now he acts like the house belongs to him. He said he’s a Christian and doesn’t want ‘a drunkard’ living under his roof. I sent more than half of that money…the money I got from you to my grandparents to buy a plot of land and build a house for them and Mum to live in, but the contractor doubled the original estimate once the work had started and I didn’t have any more to send to him. My grandfather believes that my uncle somehow got involved with the contractor and that the man and my uncle split the extra money he demanded.”


“Your uncle sounds like a piece of work.”


“He is,” Chantelle agreed. “I didn’t want him involved, but my grandparents are farmers. They are barely literate. He took over their land, saying that it was time they didn’t work as hard, but he now keeps the money when he sells the animals and the produce. They have very little money of their own.”


“So what’s the state of play with the house right now.”


“The roof is on, thank God, so the structure is not exposed to the elements, but there are no windows and the interior needs to be completed. I’m planning to go there myself at Christmas. I can’t afford it right now and I have to take Shawn and the girls, so I can’t go term time. Hopefully, I can get it all straightened out.”


“No, no.” Chantelle looked at him sharply before quickly turning back to the road. “I have a friend who will take care of it for me. All I need is the name of the contractor and the location of the property.”


“You know people in Jamaica?”


“I have property there—five apartments blocks in Kingston which are currently all occupied. And work is almost complete on the two gated communities I’m building in Montego Bay, but those won’t suit your mother and grandparents or I would move them until the house gets sorted out.”


“Gated community?” Chantelle gasped. “My grandparents are very simple people. They don’t even like going to Kingston! I managed to get a nice piece of land in the countryside. It’s not too far from the beach and there is enough land at the back for my grandfather to start farming again on a smaller scale. He’s really excited about moving to it.” Chantelle sighed. “Mr. Patrick—that’s the name of the contractor—had given me a guarantee that another ten thousand pounds will complete everything.”


“Until you send it to him and he decided that he needs another ten.” Dominic ran his right hand through his hair. “This man’s either incompetent or a con artist. Derek will pay him a visit and straighten the whole mess out.”


“But—”


“Don’t worry he won’t hurt him if it’s not necessary,” Dominic promised with an edge in his voice.


“What?”


The traffic lights ahead turned amber and then red. Chantelle slowed the car and stared across at Dominic as she automatically brought the clutch up to biting point in preparation for the change of signal.


“You heard me.”


“I don’t want anyone hurt!”


“Sometimes it’s necessary to inflict pain so that a lesson can be learned.”


“I’m not giving you his full name and address if you plan to get him beaten up!” Chantelle told him heatedly as she followed the car ahead as the lights changed. Had she somehow stepped into a parallel universe? “Especially since it’s probably my uncle’s fault!”


“Your uncle needs a lesson in family loyalty, but I promise that nothing will happen to him.” Dominic took a deep breath and exhaled it slowly. “I hate injustice.”


“And you think hurting a man because he might have conned me out of some money is justice?”


“It’s a kind of justice. Heaven knows how many other people he has conned out of their hard-earned money.” They just missed the amber signal at the next set of lights. Chantelle turned to glare at him again and he reluctantly agreed, “Okay. I promise that Derek won’t touch either of them. He’ll find out if all the money you sent has been spent on the house and if so, how much more needs to be spent. If he finds out that the funds have been misappropriated, he will have the man refund the balance or find a way for him to work it off. Whichever way, work will recommence immediately. Your mother will be in Jamaica within a week or two.”

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